There
was a time when people looked down on samba as low class street music, but now
it is recognized as a national Brazilian art form. Sound familiar, my jazz
friends? Arguably, samba is even more codified as a Brazilian cultural institution.
Tourists traveling to Brazil want to hear the samba, even if they can’t tell
the rhythm from a bossa. Martinho da Vila was playing and composing
sambas when they were disreputable, but now he is an internationally regarded
elder statesman of music. The man born Martinho José Ferreira takes us on a
tour of the samba schools and venues in his Vila Isabel neighborhood in Georges
Gachot’s O Samba (trailer here), which screens as
part of the Music + Film Brazil film series at Symphony Space.
When
watching the samba schools rehearse their tunes and craft their carnival
costumes, it is hard to avoid comparisons with New Orleans second-liners and Mardi
Gras. In both cases, music goes hand-in-hand with good times, but it also
reminds revelers of past historical struggles and fortifies them with strength
for the future. For years, “Martinho” has written show-stoppers for the Unidos
de Vila Isabel samba school. Through thick and thin, he stayed true to his
school, but also became quite a samba star in his own right. For instance, when
Nana Mouskouri decides to record a samba album at the source, it is Martinho
she looks up.
Martinho
is a likable raconteur and a charismatic performer. When he sticks to music, he
is on solid ground. Wisely, Gachot tries to do just that, only allowing politics
to creep in with respects some mild Pan-African rhetoric. (Sadly, Sr. Martinho
maintains his allegiance to the Communist ideology, apparently willfully blind
to its legacy of oppression and mass murder, much like Oscar Niemeyer.)
