At a classical orchestra, a conductor’s raised hands often means the start of a performance. Tracing shapes in the air could point to how each beat must come, and one’s free fingers can often signal a shift in dynamics.
Subtle hand signs likewise coordinate the hundreds of pounding drummers in each of the glitzy Carnival parades in Rio de Janeiro.
The roughly 70,000 spectators filling the bleachers each of the three nights of parades would be eager to see flamboyant costumes, towering floats and jaw-dropping dancers passing by, but for many samba fanatics, drums are the beating heart of the party. And the maestro’s hand swings, flicks, twists and pointing transform potential cacophony into transcendent synchrony.
Photo: Reuters
Percussionists play instruments known the world over — snare and bass drums — but also traditional local instruments such as the tambourine hand drum, the cuica friction drum, the double-sided repique, metal shakers known as chocalhos and the agogo, a two-headed cowbell originating in West Africa.
The Mocidade Independente samba school, one of Rio’s most popular, has 240 drummers in its section.
Based in the working-class Vila Vintem community, on the city’s west side, Mocidade is known for its trained drummers and legendary drum masters, like Jose Pereira da Silva, nicknamed “Mestre Andre.”
Six decades ago, he created the “little stop,” a percussion break during the parade while revelers continue singing. The technique is used to highlight key parts of a samba school’s lyrics.
“I can say that the drum section really is an orchestra, it’s greater than an orchestra, because all the people there are musicians, people who studied. Not in a samba drum section; they’re drummers,” said Carlos Eduardo Oliveira, Mocidade’s drum master for 14 years, known as “Mestre Dudu.”
Mestre Dudu signals to drum directors spread throughout the section, who relay commands to the drummers while making sure they are toggling seamlessly between the many grooves that make up a Carnival parade theme song.
“We understand each other. That’s our language. I have 16 directors in the middle of the section, in the core. I raise my hand, give a signal that will be repeated through them all, and the rhythmist understands,” Mestre Dudu said.
While some less traditional schools accept tourists into their drums sections, Mocidade only allows locals. They were to be the first school to parade in the Sambadrome last night — the final evening of Carnival.
Romualdo Gomes, a professional musician, drums for Mocidade out of love, like all his companions, but he never loses sight of the nearest director guiding the beat.
“You just pay attention to the director,” Gomes said. “You have to pay attention — there’s a way to show every groove.”
The drum section plays throughout a school’s entire parade, lasting between 70 and 80 minutes, striving to lose neither tempo nor flair. Carnival judges score parades on a 10-point scale for various categories, including drumming; it is assessed based on creativity, consistency and how well it suits each samba school’s theme and lyrics.
Classical music critic Irineu Franco Perpetuo said that artists like Mestre Dudu are indeed maestros, no less talented than those guiding orchestras. He said the drums section is the tiebreaking category whenever two samba schools have tallied the same total number of points.
“They are the conductors of this great popular opera that is our Carnival,” Perpetuo said. “They have the great challenge of being rhythmically constant during the parade. They can’t rush it, they can’t be too late, and they need to keep everyone playing at the same time.”
“A perfect 10 for the drum section carries as much weight as a Vienna Philharmonic in classical music,” he added.
TIT-FOR-TAT: The arrest of Filipinos that Manila said were in China as part of a scholarship program follows the Philippines’ detention of at least a dozen Chinese The Philippines yesterday expressed alarm over the arrest of three Filipinos in China on suspicion of espionage, saying they were ordinary citizens and the arrests could be retaliation for Manila’s crackdown against alleged Chinese spies. Chinese authorities arrested the Filipinos and accused them of working for the Philippine National Security Council to gather classified information on its military, the state-run China Daily reported earlier this week, citing state security officials. It said the three had confessed to the crime. The National Security Council disputed Beijing’s accusations, saying the three were former recipients of a government scholarship program created under an agreement between the
Sitting around a wrestling ring, churchgoers roared as local hero Billy O’Keeffe body-slammed a fighter named Disciple. Beneath stained-glass windows, they whooped and cheered as burly, tattooed wresters tumbled into the aisle during a six-man tag-team battle. This is Wrestling Church, which brings blood, sweat and tears — mostly sweat — to St Peter’s Anglican church in the northern England town of Shipley. It is the creation of Gareth Thompson, a charismatic 37-year-old who said he was saved by pro wrestling and Jesus — and wants others to have the same experience. The outsized characters and scripted morality battles of pro wrestling fit
ACCESS DISPUTE: The blast struck a house, and set cars and tractors alight, with the fires wrecking several other structures and cutting electricity An explosion killed at least five people, including a pregnant woman and a one-year-old, during a standoff between rival groups of gold miners early on Thursday in northwestern Bolivia, police said, a rare instance of a territorial dispute between the nation’s mining cooperatives turning fatal. The blast thundered through the Yani mining camp as two rival mining groups disputed access to the gold mine near the mountain town of Sorata, about 150km northwest of the country’s administrative capital of La Paz, said Colonel Gunther Agudo, a local police officer. Several gold deposits straddle the remote area. Agudo had initially reported six people killed,
SUSPICION: Junta leader Min Aung Hlaing returned to protests after attending a summit at which he promised to hold ‘free and fair’ elections, which critics derided as a sham The death toll from a major earthquake in Myanmar has risen to more than 3,300, state media said yesterday, as the UN aid chief made a renewed call for the world to help the disaster-struck nation. The quake on Friday last week flattened buildings and destroyed infrastructure across the country, resulting in 3,354 deaths and 4,508 people injured, with 220 others missing, new figures published by state media showed. More than one week after the disaster, many people in the country are still without shelter, either forced to sleep outdoors because their homes were destroyed or wary of further collapses. A UN estimate
RSS