Samba

beat
Carnival,
So
Paulo
style.
AI DAS Z U BO N K IS / G E T T Y I MAG E S

BY CLAIRE RIGBY
PHOTOS BY ANDR KLOTZ

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SELAMTAMAGAZINE.COM

Within view of So
Paulos downtown
skyline, Vai-Vais exotic
drum-troupe queen
leads the masses in
rehearsing for the
samba schools annual
Carnival parade.
Nearby, a gathered
crowd cheers on the
sambistas (samba
musicians) as they
practice onstage.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2013

25

Its a warm
Sunday
night in
So Paulo
in early
February,
the week
before
Carnival.
At the bottom of a hill in Bixiga, a historic
downtown neighborhood, three men in matching
black-and-white T-shirts are erecting a fence across
an intersection.
Outside the temporary perimeter, street-sellers
arrive with boxes packed with cans of beer and bottles of water wedged between hunks of ice. Grills are
lit and wisps of smoke start to drift across the street.
Welcome to the headquarters and rehearsal
ground of Vai-Vai, an 83-year-old institution devoted
to samba, Carnival and community.
Each year, Brazilians mark the beginning of the
Christian Lenten season with a five-day Carnival
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SELAMTAMAGAZINE.COM

festival and a multitude of ornate, highly competitive

parades. Carnival costumes, music and traditions vary
across Brazil, but one thing is certain: Daily routines
come to a halt for the festivals duration.
This particular evening has attracted hundreds
of spectators who mill about the rehearsal ground
buying cans of Brahma beer, fruity caipirinha
cocktails and small skewers of grilled meat rolled
in gritty farofa toasted cassava meal. Over to one
side, children are being lined up to practice their
parade steps. As the drumming starts, the schools
respected elder women, the baianas, begin to sway
in time.

Vai-Vais headquarters
in Bixiga a
historic downtown
neighborhood
serves as the samba
schools grounds
for everything from
float construction
to rehearsals and
community gatherings.

Samba is of african
origin, but today, Carnival
doesnt belong to the black
community exclusively.
here in bixiga, [our samba
school has] people of Italian,
Japanese, Portuguese
descent, but they are all
preserving african culture.
Fernando Penteado,
Vai-Vais director of harmony

Vai-Vai (meaning Go-Go) is one of hundreds

of so-called samba schools spanning the length
and breadth of Brazil. Known as escolas de samba in
Portuguese, samba schools are community organizations that run events year-round, often holding open rehearsals in the run-up to Carnival for
the purpose of both fundraising and community
participation. It all culminates in the immense, spectacular parades that have become the face of Brazils
Carnival and indeed, of Brazil itself worldwide.
Rio de Janeiros Marqus de Sapuca sambadrome is Brazils best-known parade ground, where
the annual competitive processions attract thousands of spectators, plus millions more via TV. But
not to be outdone by its rival city 360 kilometers
(224 miles) away, So Paulo has a sambadrome too.
There, over three nights each year, 22 samba schools
14 premier-league schools plus 8 in the second
division compete in a series of highly competitive,
all-singing, all-dancing Carnival parades.
GlItter, FeatherS and alwayS Samba

Inside the sambadrome, theres no such thing as

less is more. Or to be more precise, too much is
never enough. The gargantuan parade floats are
loaded with paint, glitter and baubles and crowned
by scores of smiling dancers, similarly dressed to
impress (albeit scantily, in some cases). Each schools
parade features as many as 4,000 costumed marchers,
who accompany the collection of lavishly decorated
floats along the long, bleacher-lined avenue.
Fernando Penteado, whose grandparents helped
found Vai-Vai in 1930, is the samba schools director
of harmony, responsible for keeping Vai-Vais portion of the all-night parade running smoothly. His
teams of harmony and discipline monitors patrol
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(TOP TO BOTTOM) NELSON ALMEIDA / AFP/GETTY IMAGES, SEBASTIAO MOREIRA / EPA/CORBIS

30

Vai-Vais baianas
the schools most
respected elder women
spin their way
through the avenue
during the first night of
So Paulos Carnival.
Costumed marchers (at
left) also accompany
the schools elaborate
floats as members
of the drum troupe
keep the samba beat
pumping.

SELAMTAMAGAZINE.COM

the sidelines, discreetly exhorting the marchers to

keep time, stay in line and above all keep singing their hearts out.
Samba is of African origin, Penteado explains.
But today, Carnival doesnt belong to the black
community exclusively. Here in Bixiga, [our samba
school has] people of Italian, Japanese, Portuguese
descent, but they are all preserving African culture.
In each schools parade, flag bearers twirl and
spin along the avenue like lavishly plumed gods and
goddesses; Carnival queens dot the processions like
glittering butterflies; and at the heart of the noisy,
gaudy, riveting spectacle, the samba schools corps of
drummers propels the floats and marchers forward
to the beat of the batucada the tight, powerful
rhythm of the samba.
To the casual observer, this might appear to be
pure, unadulterated celebration. But to the samba
schools, its the culmination of almost a years hard
work of endless planning and rehearsals, and of
hundreds of hours spent creating and decorating
floats and costumes, as carpenters, welders, sculptors and seamstresses come together with dancers,
singers and organizers to make Carnival happen.
Its also an incredibly serious competition in
which winning is everything.
Mrcio Paloschi serves as Vai-Vais artistic director. It all comes down to the details, he says.
Hundreds of them. We have to bear in mind the
way the parade will look out there on the avenue,
from up close and from far away and also what
it will look like on television. Carnival is very much
made for TV.
This year, Vai-Vai is competing to be crowned
champion for what would be the 15th time in its
history. The schools are judged on everything from
the flag-bearers flourishes to the time-keeping, and
from the overall execution of the chosen theme to
the song (a new song is produced by each school
every year and belted out throughout the procession,
incessantly, by the entire troupe).
The finer points of the scoring system are all

Vai-Vai is about so much more

than just Carnival. we have
big plans to increase our social
projects among needy families
and, given a bit more space, to
open up a series of brand-new
cultural projects.
darcy Silva, Vai-Vais president

but impossible to understand for outsiders, who

are mostly content to stand in the bleachers and
be dazzled by the kitsch magnificence of the whole
thing, as it rumbles and sambas past.
Whats easier to grasp, once you get a close-up
glimpse, is the sense of community at the heart of
it all.
Bixiga was founded by Italian immigrants and
ex-slaves and is still a stronghold of So Paulos black
community. In fact, Bixigas Afro-Brazilian roots can
be traced back to the 19th century and the Saracura
quilombo a community of fugitive slaves living on
the banks of the now-buried Saracura Creek.
In addition to lively rehearsals, held in the months
leading up to Carnival, Vai-Vai runs neighborhood
activities year-round. These include childrens dance
and drumming classes, adult literacy and English
lessons, and food and milk distribution projects
for those in need. And on Saturday afternoons,
the school hosts family-oriented fundraising feasts
of Brazils most emblematic dish: a rich pork-andblack-bean stew called feijoada, served with rice.
bIxIGaS tenuouS Future

Down on the rehearsal ground, Vai-Vais Sundaynight rehearsal is in full swing. In one area, samba
musicians and a powerful singer lead the crowd in
this years song, Sangue da Terra (Blood of the Land)
an homage to the sponsor, Wines of Brazil.
Trying out their samba steps as they move through
the crowd in a tight pack are 30 or so women clad in
tight black dresses and dizzyingly high heels. Some
will dance solo at the head of a wing of marchers

while others will samba on tiny podiums on Vai-Vais

various floats. Although they perspire with the effort
on this hot summer night, they stay smiling with a
queenly benevolence, heads held high.
Theres only one real queen at this rehearsal,
though, and shes the exquisitely beautiful Camila
Silva, Vai-Vais rainha da bateria (drum-troupe queen)
for the past five years. During the parade, the rainhas
job is to lead the massed drummers, responding to
their powerful rhythms and thrilling the crowd with
her smiles, flourishes, and burst of both charm and
virtuoso samba dancing all the more mesmerizing given the high heels, glittering costume and
sculpted curves of glowing skin.
Silva is generally agreed to have the most highly
prized quality a rainha can have: samba no p, an
innate, unfaltering sense of samba in her feet. She
presides over the rehearsal regally, sambaing for a
few moments at the head of the drum troupe, then
hanging back on the sidelines, bestowing smiles and
kisses on wide-eyed children or posing for photos
with nonchalant-acting young men.
Silvas husband and the president of Vai-Vai,
Darcy Silva, leans against a podium nearby, watching the drum troupe and smoking a fat cigar. Besides
the parade, Silva has a lot on his mind. Hes recently
learned that despite the schools deep roots in Bixiga,
Vai-Vais days in the neighborhood are numbered: Its
headquarters sit right in the path of a much-needed
new line of So Paulos subway system.
Since learning of the potential construction project, Vai-Vai members have been combing Bixiga for
alternative locations, as desperate to stay in the neighborhood as many local residents are to keep it there.
Vai-Vais headquarters isnt just any old place,
wrote the So Paulo architect and urban planner
Raquel Rolnik in her influential blog, Habitat. Its an
essential element in the important (and often invisible) presence of Afro-Brazilian culture in the city.
We cant imagine ourselves anywhere else, said
Fernando Penteado when the news emerged in
January. If we had to leave Bixiga, it would be like
tearing our heart out.
But the area is heavily built up, like so much of
So Paulo a city whose skyline is a jumble of endless high-rises stretching to the horizon and there
are simply no suitable spaces available.
A number of local samba schools have previously been granted premises by the city government,
which sees them as an essential part of So Paulo
culture. With that in mind, Vai-Vai has set its sights
on Luz, another historic neighborhood close by.
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The once-grand Luz has fallen on hard times over

the past 20 years or more and is in desperate need
of revitalization. Theres a sense at Vai-Vai that the
school could both solve its imminent problem and
help revive a troubled area.
Vai-Vai is about so much more than just
Carnival, says Darcy Silva. We have big plans to
increase our social projects among needy families
and, given a bit more space, to open up a series of
brand-new cultural projects.
lIGhtS, Camera, aCtIon

At the sambadrome on the night of February 8,

Vai-Vais big moment has finally come. The troupe
is primed in the holding area, ready to roll as final
touches are added to the floats. The merendeiros
teams of men who push the motorless floats along
the avenue brace themselves as the floats lights
are switched on, costumes are adjusted and showbiz
smiles are plastered onto everyones faces.
As the school sets out along the 530-meter-long
avenue, Vai-Vais theme unspools with a series of
tableaux straight out of a childrens coloring book: a
Middle-Ages grape harvest, Cleopatras banquet for
Marcus Antonius, and the biblical miracle of water
turned into wine. In the latter section, a float in the
shape of a goblet features white-clad women who
enter on one side and men in wine-colored costumes
who emerge on the other.
For most of the participants, the parade is
everything they have dreamed of, and the schools
members are upbeat after performing. But at the
results ceremony a few nights later, Vai-Vai learns
that it has placed a disappointing seventh out of
the 14 top-tier schools its worst result since 2004.
But Vai-Vais members pick themselves up again,
ready to swing into the preparations and challenges of next year, including the imminent exit
from Bixiga. If we have to leave, our goal is to be
installed in our new home in time for the World
Cup, says Darcy Silva, referring to the football
tournament scheduled to kick off in So Paulo in
June 2014.
So who knows: One Sunday night in June next
year, Vai-Vai might just find itself dancing in a new
neighborhood in a brand-new home, sambaing to
the beat as the whistle blows for kick-off inside the
citys new football stadium.
Whatever happens, though, one thing is certain:
Vai-Vai looks set to be around, and at the heart
of So Paulos Carnival culture, for many years
to come.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2013

T H E

I N - F L I G H T

M A G A Z I N E

O F

Samba
beat
Inside
brazils
Carnival.

E T H I O P I A N

A I R L I N E S