Free Bossa Nova: The Story of the Brazilian Music That Seduced the World by Ruy Castro Page A

later again centering around Donato, for another brave task: rebuilding Lúcio Alves’ Namorados da Lua—without Lúcio. The latter furnished them with his repertoire, the arrangements and part of the name of the group (Namorados) reserving the right to keep the moon for possible future use. Pressured by Paulo Serrano, Os Namorados recorded at Sinter that year a new version of “Eu quero um samba” (I Want A Samba), which was even more amazing than Lúcio’s original version released in 1945.
    This is a record that has to be heard to be believed. In Donato’s new arrangement, the bass notes of his accordion fractured the rhythm with musical syncopation like machine-gun fire and produced a beat that anticipated, almost note for note, that of João Gilberto’s guitar, five years before Gilberto’s recording of “Chega de saudade” (No More Blues). It was so modern that, at the time, no one understood it—and Os Namorados stayed where they were.
    Dozens of vocal ensembles were formed and banded in Rio at the end of the forties, but there was one that seemed indestructible: Os Cariocas. From the time that they turned professional in 1946, with their composition of members already established—Ismael Netto, his brother Severino Filho, Badeco,Quartera, and Valdir—Os Cariocas were regarded, at least at the Murray, as the General Motors of vocal ensembles. (Just for the record, the Hi-Los, whom it was later said they copied, were formed in 1953.) Os Cariocas were the most complete in all aspects. While other groups disintegrated due to lack of leadership, Ismael would make them rehearse until a mere hello uttered by any one of them resonated perfectly—and no one complained.
    They were also on Rádio Nacional, which in itself gave them five times the advantage over the competition because the Nacional was
the
network of the era. The program in which they starred,
Um milhão de melodies
(A Million Melodies), was produced by Haroldo Barbosa, which guaranteed at least two or three versions of American songs per week and gave the impression that one was listening to the Pied Pipers in Portuguese. This was ironic because it’s possible that Os Cariocas were even better than the Pied Pipers—but who would have believed such an absurd concept then?
    Not coincidentally, Os Cariocas’s first hit “Adeus, América” (Goodbye, America) by Barbosa and Geraldo Jacques, in 1948, was a cynical and mocking invocation of musical nationalism—”
Eu digo adeus ao boogie-woogie, ao woogie-boogie / E ao swing também / Chega de hots, fox-trots e pinotes / Que isto não me convém
” (I say goodbye to boogie-woogie, to woogie-boogie / And to swing as well / No more hots, fox-trots, and jitterbugs / Because this sort of thing doesn’t agree with me)—all rolled into an energetic boogie-woogie cum samba, at which it was impossible not to laugh. The cultured folk understood. However, given that no one passed through Rádio Nacional with impunity, the other great hit by Os Cariocas, in 1950, had the kind of rhythm that, for some, served little purpose but for choreographing the killing of a cockroach in a corner of the living room: the
baião
, particularly the most popular
baião
, “Juazeiro,” by Luís Gonzaga and Humberto Teixeira. This time, cultured folk did not understand. For those who could not accept hearing a group called Os Cariocas singing exotic blends of music from the north, there was an obvious explanation: Ismael and Severino, the group’s leaders, were really not Cariocas, (that is, Rio de Janeiro-born) but from Pará, in northern Brazil.

    The boys of the Sinatra-Farney Fan Club turned their noses up at Rádio Nacional, accusing it of being too “Jararaca and Ratinho” (hillbilly) for their tastes, but that was because they didn’t listen to it firsthand. In 1950, the Nacional was one of the few absolutely professional organizations in a country that prided itself on its amateur status and, despite being owned