Samba
Bossa nova, the new revolution in samba

The period between Juscelino Kubitschek 's inauguration in 1956, until the political crisis in the João Goulart government that culminated in the 1964 Brazilian coup d'état, was characterized by great effervescence on the Brazilian music scene, especially in Rio de Janeiro. Although it lost its status as the country's capital after the inauguration of Brasília, the city maintained its position as a major cultural hub in the country and urban samba, whose transformations on the radio, the music industry, nightclubs and among the circles of university middle class youth resulted in bossa nova – a term by which a new style of rhythmic accompaniment and interpretation of samba spread from the South Zone of Rio de Janeiro became known.

At a time when the appeal to the traditional was gaining new momentum, bossa nova would mark the entire structure of creation and listening supported by established genres, considering that it sought a renewal within the tradition of samba. Initially called "modern samba" by the Brazilian music critic, this new sub-genre was officially inaugurated with the composition " Chega de Saudade ", by Antonio Carlos Jobim and Vinicius de Moraes, released in 1958 in two versions: one sung by Elizeth Cardoso and the other with the singer, songwriter, and guitarist João Gilberto. A Bahian-born living in Rio, Gilberto radically changed the way of interpreting samba until then, changing the harmonies with the introduction of unconventional guitar chords and revolutionizing the classic syncope of the genre with a unique rhythmic division. These formal Gilbertian experiences were consolidated in the studio album Chega de Saudade, released in 1959, and triggered the emergence of an artistic movement around Gilberto and others professional artists such as Antonio Carlos Jobim, Vinicius de Moraes, Baden Powell, Alaíde Costa, Sylvia Telles, among others, which attracted young amateur musicians from the South Zone of Rio – almost all from the middle class and with university degrees – such as Carlos Lyra, Roberto Menescal, Ronaldo Boscoli and Nara Leão.

Consolidated in the following years as a type of concert samba, non-dancing, and comparable to American cool jazz, bossa nova has become a sambistic sub-genre of great reputation on the Brazilian music scene and, with its rhythm, more assimilable abroad than traditional samba, became known worldwide. After being released on the American market in a series of concerts in New York City in late 1962, Brazilian bossa nova albums were reissued in several countries, while new songs and albums were recorded, including with foreign artists. Several of these works – with the samba " The Girl from Ipanema ", by Antonio Carlos Jobim and Vinicius de Moraes, at the frontline – became major international successes. However, in the midst of the turbulence that marked the Brazilian political scene at the time, the movement suffered a dissent, which resulted in the so-called "nationalist current". With the intention of carrying out a work more engaged and aligned with the social context of the period, the nationalist bossa-novistas formed around Nara Leão, Carlos Lyra, Sérgio Ricardo, Edu Lobo, and the partnership between Vinicius de Moraes and Baden Powell, the latter two signing a fertile partnership that resulted in the studio album " Os Afro-sambas ", with positive international impact.

In addition to bossa nova, other new samba sub-genres emerged in this period between the late 1950s and early 1960s. The rise of nightclubs as the main nightlife venues in Rio disseminated variety shows with the participation of sambistas and samba dancers, mainly performed by instrumental musical ensemble with keyboard, electric guitar, acoustic bass guitar, drums and percussion, and performed by crooners. A trend in the 1960s live music in Brazil, this format of "samba to dance" resulted in styles such as the sambalanço – a very lively and dancing type of samba, from which musicians such as Ed Lincoln and performers such as Sílvio César, Pedrinho Rodrigues, Orlandivo, Miltinho and Elza Soares stood out. In this same environment, samba-jazz also emerged, consolidated with the success of bossa nova that brought samba and bebop closer together, initially based on the piano-bass-drums musical ensemble and later broader formations. Also under this context, the composer Jorge Ben emerged with his peculiar and hybrid way of playing samba, mixing elements of bossa nova and American blues and rock'n'roll that would even take samba songs such as " Mas que Nada " and "Chove Chuva", released by Sérgio Mendes & Brazil '66, to the Billboard charts. And at the end of the 1960s, samba-funk emerged, led by pianist Dom Salvador, which mixed the two beats to the bar of samba and the four beats to the bar of American funk that had just arrived in the Brazilian music market at that time.

The period was also characterized by the profusion of some partner dance samba styles. These were the cases of Samba de Gafieira, a dance style developed in the ballroom dance of suburban clubs in Rio de Janeiro frequented by people with low purchasing power throughout the 1940s and 1950s and which also became a fad among upper-middle-class people in the 1960s, and the samba rock, a dance style born in the São Paulo suburban parties in the 1960s, mixing steps from samba, rock and Caribbean rhythms such as rumba and salsa. The "bailes blacks" ("black balls") experienced their peak notably in Rio and São Paulo in the 1970s, a time of great diffusion of the American black music in Brazil, which were frequently disseminated at these "bailes blacks". This also generated a new debate among the Brazilian music critic about the foreign influence on Brazilian music and also on samba itself.
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