Brazilian National Identity in the Lyrics of Chico Buarque

Abstract

Music has a fundamental role in the popular culture of contemporary Brazil. Not only does music represent Brazilian national cultural identity, or brasilidade, to the international community, it is also a vehicle for internal expressions of identity, especially where popular movements such as Música Popular Brasileira – MPB [Brazilian Popular Music] are concerned.

Composer, singer, poet and writer Chico Buarque de Hollanda is one of the most important artists in the development of Brazilian Popular Music since his debut as musician and composer in 1964. Over the last four decades, Chico Buarque’s production represents his understanding about “his people”, the Brazilians. He describes in some of his songs the Brazilians and their ways of coping with problems, their life’s ambitions and hopes in this social mosaic that is Brazil. This study will examine Chico Buarque’s representation of Brazilian national cultural identity through the Brazilian people he describes in his work, such as the peasant, the poor, the hard worker, and the malandro. When the artist talks about his people, he discusses the injustice and inequality, which reach a huge part of Brazil’s population. Most of the population of Brazil is mestiço (orthographically represented as ‘mestizo’ in English) that is the marginalized and forgotten people of Brazil. They are the result of the mix from three different ethnic groups: the Indigenous, who were the native people of Brazil, the Portuguese, who were the first Europeans to arrive in Brazil and the Africans, who were brought to Brazil by the Portuguese to work as slaves.

I will analyze some of Chico Buarque’s production, such as “Tem Mais Samba” (1964), “Olê, Olá” (1965), “A Banda” (1966), “Pedro Pedreiro” (1965), “Televisão” (1967), “Apesar de Você” (1970) and “Construção” (1971), that deals with the representation of Brazilian national cultural identity via the image of the Brazilian people and their longing for a better life.

My findings will show that Chico Buarque’s compositions are a clear demonstration of the historical changes that have produced a class of people who are disenchanted with their societal structure, and that they are of vital relevance to the contemporary cultural understanding of Brazil.