AfroReggae

This past weekend was the first bloco parade weekend, and I ran into 3 parades just in the Largo do Machado while trying to walk home. Or was it the same parade in 3 different places? I'm not sure, but it took a while to get home. I heard the huge drag-queen parade of Bloco Ipanema, down on Ipanema beach, drew 30,000 paraders. But I went instead to Bloco AfroReggae, which had its first "rehearsal" (party) Sunday at the park in the Arpoador.

AfroReggae is Rio's sole samba-reggae bloco, and one of the few black blocos as well. (Not a coincidence - samba-reggae is a black-pride genre.) It's the group that was featured in the Oscar-nominated American documentary "Favela Rising" and also in a Brazilian documentary "Nenhum Motivo Explica A Guerra" (No Reason Can Justify War). (If you've already seen Favela Rising, check out the other movie - it's a different point of view.) They are a brave and community-oriented group that is working hard at community service, trying to convince favela kids to join AfroReggae and learn to play music, instead of joining the drug gangs.

Well, they were REALLY great! For their big Carnaval bloco they keep it simple, and just play a basic samba-reggae and faster frevo-type axe, backed up by their excellent pro band. But where they really shine is their energy. Nonstop dancing and incredible power. They'd painted their drums all kinds of different colors; looked beautiful and it all seemed very festive.

I got dancing and couldn't stop. Partway through it all I thought, wow, I really LOVE samba-reggae. As opposed to, say, pagode, which I sort of tolerate, and even play and practice, but do not really deeply love. Pagode usually makes me yawn. (One exception: the fantastic Monday band at Carioca da Gema, where I am going tonight.) But samba-reggae, like escola-de-samba, always makes me dance. The whole crowd got jumping and leaping around and doing silly conga lines. (I posted a little movie. The sound is pathetic because the camera mic was clipping nonstop, but you can see the fun everybody was having.) Awesome. They'll be there again next Sunday, 4pm, in the park at the Arpoador, right between Copacabana & Ipanema.

Their repertoire made me laugh because it was actually Rio-style classic samba songs and funk songs, the same songs lots of other blocos play, but just played to a samba-reggae beat. There's definitely a Twenty Greatest Hits for songs that every Brazilian crowd will sing along to, and most blocos draw heavily from that small set. The good blocos add in their own stuff too, but it's funny to hear the same songs turning up again and again. There are 4 songs that Monobloco, Banga, and AfroReggae all do - but each bloco uses completely different rhythms for any given song. The same song might be played as a merengue by AfroReggae, a funk by Banga, and a coco by Monobloco. It has been interesting to see how freely they experiment with putting classic songs to different rhythms. Makes me realize we are a little strait-jacketed in the US.