Depoimento de Ronaldo Bastos

Identification

Name/ Place and date of birth

My name is Ronaldo Bastos Ribeiro. I was born in Niterói – more precisely at Itacaraí beach – in January 21st, 1948.

Family

Parents

My parents are Vicente Belo Ribeiro and Mariana Bastos Ribeiro. I believe there wasn’t a direct connection between my parents and music. In my family there weren’t any musicians or poets. There wasn’t this tradition in the family.

Family

Siblings

I have three brothers: Raimundo, the eldest; Roberto – I’m the third one – and my youngest brother is Vicente.

Family

Uncle

I had an uncle who was kind of a poet, my uncle José, but I think he was more of a crazy person than a poet. Crazy in the sense of eccentric. He was a doctor, a nice guy. I don’t know exactly what he wrote, but literarily there wasn’t great value.

Childhood

Childhood Memories

I was a boy who would stay in the street. I lived on a slope – almost in the center of Niterói -, but it was all very near. In my childhood, I remember I studied in Icaraí, I would walk to school, I would play soccer in the street, I would stay on top of a guava tree for a long time. I had a mischievous childhood. And I listened to the radio – I think that’s when my first connection with music began, all through radio.

Musical Background

Music preferences

At the time, I listened to everything, especially Rádio Nacional – that was TV Globo from that time. Rádio Nacional was something that helped to constitute Brazil as we know today. And it constituted me. I remember that Caetano has already said much about this Rádio Nacional thing too, as a reference. I would listen to Marlene, Emilinha, Batista sisters, Nora Nei and those shows: “Jerônimo, o herói do sertão” (“Jerônimo, hero of the backwoods”), “O Anjo” (“The Angel”), Celso Alencar shows, all these things. I know I would stick to the radio when I wasn’t in the street or when I wasn’t at school.

Childhood

Childhood Memories

At the time, the radio was always on. I didn’t listen to it by myself – in some moments I must have listened to the radio alone, but I didn’t have that. The radio was something that would stay on in the houses, I don’t know if it was in all houses, but I remember it a little, that radio was something present in people’s life. I also remember a little the soap operas in the radio, but I don’t know if I ever got to accompany them. The thing that you’ll be hearing most in the deposition is “I don’t remember”, because my memory today is a little affected… I was talking to Márcio Borges soon before this deposition and sometimes we don’t remember much of the facts, we remember more the feeling. My feeling from my childhood is a very happy feeling, because one always describes their childhood as a happy country. To many people, unfortunately is not like that, but for me that’s the feeling I have.

Cities

Rio de Janeiro

Most of my aunts and uncles lived in Rio, so I had very present this thing of crossing the bay. So much as that, when I came to live in Rio, I kept my dentist in Niterói, only to have to do that. And there were the Niterói uncles, and I would make the inverse path. That was when I was already in Pedro II School, in Rio.

People

Heitor dos Prazeres

Today, I go to shows a lot, because I like very much to see people’s work. I’m a very participative guy – neither in politics nor in my class only -, I’m very curious about what people do. But I’m very connected to plastic arts, especially to painting. I have the impression that first thing that attracted me was to have seen Heitor dos Prazeres in a magazine, and have, somehow, managed to get to him – I don’t remember how. I would skip class in Pedro II to go to his studio, which was behind Central do Brasil, and I would stay there doing nothing, skipping school, seeing Heitor paint and talking to him. I must have been about 15 years. I believe that, other than this painting thing, what also attracted me was this samba thing. It’s like that quote – I don’t know if it’s Tom Jobim’s or João Gilberto’s – that says: “In the end, what I do is samba”. I think I was fascinated, actually, about samba. And Heitor dos Prazeres was a way that I found to get closer. A boy’s joy. At this time, you collect things, and then you go for it. And one of these curiosities of mine was about samba.

Musical Background

Compositions

I think that music has always been in my life. In some mysterious way, because there was no record of it and I have never had a musical instrument at home. My attempts to learn to play the guitar were also disastrous. But, in some mysterious way, I feel more musician than poet. Because there’s something in Brazil that, because I am a white guy, middle class, have gone to college, all these things, people have a tendency to call me poet. I don’t feel poet, I mean, I feel as poet as anyone who has poetical feeling. But I don’t call myself a poet, because I think a poet is someone who dedicates himself to something that is to write poems. I don’t think that, I don’t see myself as someone who’s up to that. In fact I’m a popular composer, guided by the music and the music of the words. Of course, I read poetry; you grow these interests, not only for reading, but also for other arts. And this curiosity, somehow, influences. But the fact that I like painting so much, plastic arts, for example, doesn’t make me a plastic artist. Honestly, I see in the lyrics of the sambas of certain sambistas – like Mrs. Ivone Lara, like people from samba, Luís Carlos da Vila – a poetic density much bigger than the thing I write. And I say it with most honesty. I think this poet thing, in my case, is much more a feeling that I have for some people, a craft I’ve learned, to put words in songs, guided by a non-grown music intuition. Just that. So I always run away from this question. I run away in the sense that I don’t let it get to me, because I think it’s unfair. I’m a popular composer and somehow music has always been with me.

Musical Background

Influences

My craft, which is to write lyrics, I learned from other people, from other songs. Actually, I learned from songs – and I’m always learning. There’s something I always say – the other day I saw Fernando Brant quoting it in a chronicle of his – that is: “To me, song moves the world; it’s more important than everything”. So I’ve learned from songs, until today. I mean, I write songs about the songs I like – contesting it or admiring it. But deep inside everything I do there’s something I’ve learned and I preserve, and I believe, somehow, have achieved this goal: I wanted to be a composer when I was a kid in school, and I think that, somehow, I learned to do that.

People

Dorival Caymmi

If someone asks me: “Who did you learn more from ?” I say: “From Dorival Caymmi”. I think I created a style from that, which is a style of briefness; of every word being connected to the music of the melody, of never forcing it, of every sentence saying something itself. That’s why I owe all to him.

People

João Gilberto

I started something else now, to vary… I started saying I learned to write lyrics from João Gilberto – which is also great as a metaphor, because he’s exactly the guy who’s not a writer, when he’s a writer he does: “É o amor, é oba lalá… oba lalá…” (“It’s the love, it’s wow lala…. Wow lala…”.

Musical Background

Singing

I think I am, in fact, a singer. And when I was a kid, my first relation with music was that I wanted to be a singer. I sang, and I think I did it well. I have a trauma, because someone had a recorder, and the first time I heard my voice I thought it was so horrible that I aborted my singer career. But I sang and I tried to learn.

Musical Background

Instrument/ Accordion

At the time, in Brazil, everyone would play or learn the accordion, because of that Mário Mascarenhas’ Academy. So I had a little older neighbor, Rose, who taught accordion. I tried to learn it from her, and I had already a repertory that I would go to the little parties and sing. I would sing “Only You” and a song by Ivon Cury – quite eclectic – called “Lavadeiras de Portugal”. But I would sing; including one time that I went to Friburgo’s radio, I sang and I got a prize, which was a bottle of a wine called Jurubeba – I wasn’t even old enough to drink, but I sang. The wine must have been terrible, but I was happy that the radio had given me a prize.

Musical Background

Influences

This radio thing is only less important than those loudspeakers on the square, that sometimes wasn’t even a radio, it was a guy that would broadcast music there, and people would sit on the square to listen to it. And then, this songs, which were popular in Brazil, were the good songs – the labels had great orchestras, great conductors, great arrangements and great singers – and singers had to really sing, because everything was recorded at once, there wasn’t this channel thing: “Change the channel, send to Pro Tools”, all that stuff.

Musical Background

Compositions

So, in fact, I’m a composer that sings melodies, and I find out which words are there. And I live with the melody for such a long time, singing this melody, that I end up learning to sing – although I think I’m out of tune, a terrible singer. I’ve caught myself teaching some partners, who are excellent singers – great singers – to sing certain melody. Later, I say: “Well, but I was singing a melody to Elis, what an absurd”. But that’s because I listened to the song for a long time and I learned to sing that somehow. So I listen to the melody, hum it and put the words. Let’s say 98% of my composing process is this. I write very little before, or poems, as people say, to be given a melody. And I did it very little, especially because, once, I picked on that. I picked on that because I thought there were some people that were writing lyrics that didn’t have this connection with the song, with the music, and that didn’t sing the songs; they would just write a few things to be given a melody because they started thinking that was a nice profession, that brought money. Then I picked on it and I refused to do it – but I could do more than that. But what I do is to learn a melody, live with it, and find out a little of what’s hidden there. I talk about this as a sculpture; it’s like you already know what’s in there. When you have a marble block, for example, I think the first thing to do is to see what’s in there, to try to understand. You can make mistakes, but before you start sculpting you have to feel a little of this, I think it takes a little time for it to get to you. And after that it’s time to work, go for it. And then it’s the work.

There was a time when this inspiration question was really annoying: what’s more, if it is inspiration or perspiration. And I thought this subject was very annoying. Because inspiration isn’t something you can control, it’s something you don’t know what it is. And perspiration is the only thing you can do, which is to go inside that. It’s just like this poetry thing – feelings we all have. The thing is you, in a certain way, to expose yourself in each song, put everything there. I think the songs we used to write in the 70’s had something that was visceral. I mean, in each song you would spend a year – I was a guy known for spending a year writing a song. And also if in this year’s time everything had changed, I would throw that song away. Those songs had that. After a certain moment, I think first because I needed it… because I didn’t have another career, so I had to live in a universe of complicated copyright, of not doing shows, of being just a songwriter. I had to live in this universe, so I had to write songs. But mostly because I think this feeling thing, this song feeling, was already deeply rooted. And I started to find out that, on the other side, we complicated it a little. When you listen to the music classics, especially the American music classics that the great singers sing, all of them record the same songs and no one was shocked. But here in Brazil it’s different. If someone recorded, some people say: “No one will record it anymore”. For example, a song that a guy writes about a Japanese girl waiting for an American mariner that is mooring in the harbor. The guy writes a song like that and it’s a hit, and it’s considered a classic – but in fact, it’s a song from a musical, which fulfilled its function in a scene. In the 70’s, if you were writing a song, you would start like this: “But I’m not a Japanese girl, just imagine if I’m going to write a song about waiting for an American mariner”. So, when I found that out – that you could write songs and that this feeling was already with you -, I didn’t have to be a martyr everyday. It was about you, in each song, giving all.

Songs

“Chuva de Prata” (“Silver Rain”)

For example, when I wrote “Chuva de Prata”, I wrote it because the melody was interesting for me. And also because, in the first place, I had to live. So the melody was interesting, because I think that was a time when melodies didn’t flow much. I wrote and soon after that the song was a big hit, everyone liked it, sang it, but there was this criticism demand. Once I read in the newspaper a critic saying that this song was a confirmation of the cheap-chic theories. And I was coining those sentences Márcio Borges must know: “Even when I make prêt-à-porter, couture, the French couturiers interest me more than the Greek philosophers”. Then I told someone to tell the guy, off the record, this: “I don’t understand why you say I wrote a song to confirm the cheap-chic theories from the great Eduardo Dusek, because I don’t know what cheap-chic is, I only know what chic is” – although I really like to write popular songs.

Musical Background

Compositions

I write popular songs very well, I know how to do it because I always do it. You see Michael Sullivan, for example, who was the king of popular music at the time, they were all hits; he would kiss my hand and say this: “You are the only guy that does what we know to do, but put something else and the critics don’t dare to say bad things about you. Even when they do, you soon give them an answer”.

Work

Partnerships

But I started liking better to do write songs with multiple partners, multiple styles. And the excuse of what I needed gave me a great freedom to do this. And I also didn’t have to spend a year writing a song, even though I don’t write a song in five minutes – I could, but… and it’s funny that all this description, in the end, didn’t correspond to the “caymmish” simplicity. So I think that’s what makes my style. It’s to come from another side, go trough other paths and, somehow, get to Caymmi, intact there – at least for me.

Teenage years

How Brazil was

My generation was lucky to live in a Brazil where things united us – and there’s nothing nostalgic about that, neither my speech nor myself are nostalgic. School was a very rich experience in this way, because there were young people wanting to know things. I believe that in some schools it’s probably still like this. But I also know that, at my time, it wasn’t like that actually – we always picture the past like this. Probably there were also few groups or few people, and the rest was a bunch of idiots, like today they probably still are. Especially during teenage years, everybody is a jerk, including us. But we, at least, thought ourselves as less jerks. So this class at Pedro II, which was a very nice class, went searching for information – which is what other people, should do if they don’t – I mean, the struggle for information in the books, albums, this thing.

Musical Background

Songs

And I had a partner in school named Sérgio Rubens Torres, with whom I wrote my first songs. And it was a success at the time. There were some songs that I can’t sing anymore, I don’t remember, but I wouldn’t show anymore, because there’s nothing in it there’s relevant. But I liked these songs very much; I liked this partnership very much. And I started to really feel composer. And there was a song – which must be very bad today – that was my great hit. It was called “Joaninha” (“Ladybug”). It was something else

People

Sérgio Ricardo

But I took a risk. I think the first person I met outside, after Heitor, were a couple of neighbors – but that was already in Botafogo, in Rio de Janeiro – and they were a couple. I listened much to Caymmi with them and they made friends with Sérgio Ricardo. Then I went to Sérgio Ricardo’s house. I used to read much, at that time, a Brazilian author that we don’t read today – unfortunately – named Aníbal Machado, who has a tale called “The death of the standard bearer”. Then I wrote a lyric, “The death of the ensign”, in Sérgio Ricardo’s house. The first line was “Whirl of stars” – it was terrible I wanted him to put a melody in it, and he said to me: “No. If I write a song with you now, you’ll think you’re a fabulous composer, because it will solve your life, you got it? So it’s best for you to write a song with your group, with your people”. That was very nice for me, because then I went after my group.

Family

Dwelling

At the time I studied at Colégio Pedro II, I still lived in Laranjeiras, which was the first place I lived in Rio de Janeiro, in front of the glorious club of Fluminense Futebol Clube. After that I moved to Voluntários da Pátria Street, where I lived for a while. I would go to Pedro II, in the center of the city, and soon after I moved to Recife.

Cities

Recife

In Recife, I had a much bigger contact with music – also, I was already a little older. At the time, I met some people in Recife, who were from the theater and music group from there. Three days ago I met Alceu Valença, who is an artist I like very much. I was telling that I passed by him in some parties – this little parties time -, I passed by the singer Teca Calazans, the music producer Túlio Feliciano, a music theoretician named Gilmar Muniz de Brito – who was a teacher, a big intellectual from Recife -, the theater director Benjamin Santos, and some people that at the time were in a show called “Construção” (“Construction”), which was something before “Opinião” (“Opinion”) show in Rio de Janeiro. And there was this thing of walking around, walking in the rain, these experiences… Much this thing of playing the guitar and listening to music. So there was this event in Recife.

Education

College

Later, I came back to Rio de Janeiro and took “Vestibular” (Brazilian test to join an University). I went to “Paid, passed” schools to finish high school and took vestibular to National Philosophy School, to History major, and I started to study it. And it was in college that I met the guys from Clube da Esquina. I studied History I think until the beginning of the third year. Then I went into exile in Europe. I came back to Brazil and studied Communication, which was in fact a great time of happenings – I went to Communication School because, as I was a little lost from my group, I took vestibular for what Eliane Jobim, wife of my friend Paulo Jobim, was taking. I said: “I’ll take it too”. I took it; I passed, got in and stayed there. There was a nice group – from the poets, from Chacal, who is a poet that I’ll mention later, with the Nuvem Cigana thing. That’s it, I’m majored in Communication, thing I’ve never practiced. I think I even meddle in a lot of things, but I’ve never practiced.

Work

Professional Activities

I had the beginning of a job in the Communication area, a traineeship: I worked in the creation of an advertising company and after that I think I worked a lot, but I never worked officially in anything.

Historical Events

Military Dictatorship

I think there was one thing that I remember much, the first feeling of not feeling well, which was the Dictatorship, the Military Coup. Even then, it didn’t stop us from doing everything we did when we were young. I think there was this Brazil that we’re nostalgic, the still “country of kindness”, although there was social injustice, class difference, corruption – all these things always existed. When we talk about this Brazil, it looks like it’s not that; there wasn’t exploitation and all. But there wasn’t this pressure we all feel today. Rio de Janeiro was wonderful – it’s still wonderful, despite the rulers we have today, the lack of everything, the ruin -, it was an absolute wonder, it was a free, poetic, with no limits, cool youth.

Teenage Years

In my teenage years, we used to have many little parties – I love these words “little party”; there’s a song by a rock band that says: “Festinha” (Little party). I loved to say that. I walked around the city, I did that a lot. I would go out of the party and walk from Copacabana to Laranjeiras, in the middle of the night. I liked to play guitar in the beach, to date, to walk around, all these things that people would do.

Historical Events

Military Dictatorchip

The effect of dictatorship in my life, seeing it today, it doesn’t seem to be so big, but for a young man is like a nightmare. You say: “It’s never going to end”. The basic idea at this time – and it was the basic idea especially through Clube da Esquina – was to change the world. But change the world through social justice. I mean, you started to feel that we needed to change the world, but you still have a world that’s cordial, and you start to bet on certain ideas, certain ways, and, suddenly, something like dictatorship comes along and shuts it all down; it’s terrible. I think this experience marked everyone. It marked the Brazilian art somehow – in a good and in a bad way, because not everything produced during the dictatorship was good. The other day, Caetano said that – I think that a little exaggeratedly – and I agree in a way: not every art produced before the dictatorship was good, but at the time we saw it that way. Not every song with metaphors – exaggeratedly metaphoric – to escape the censorship was good. But we saw it that way. Another idea about this time that I disagree is that the dictatorship stimulated the artist. I think that if you have an obstacle like this, you go for it, because there’s no other way. Unless you give up living, there’s no other way. You say: “Well, let’s fight”. So, when you have dictatorship, you also have to wake up in the morning and say: “Let’s fight”. Now, I don’t think that the dictatorship stimulates. Of course I’m a guy interested in politics, I’m a citizen and all, but I’m much more interested in esthetic issues. I think the troubles we live, we discuss, are easy to solve. Mankind already has the knowledge and technology to solve those issues; it’s just about wanting and having political will to do so. I already know what I think about these things, I’m interested, I read the news, but I’m interested in esthetical issues. And to the esthetical issues you have to propose so many difficulties, which, when they don’t exist, you have to create them in order to don’t get used to yourself and think it’s nice. It’s like you taking something that takes your conscience and you think that everything you’re writing or singing is cool – even if it’s not, in that moment you think it is. So I think I’m so interested in these issues that the life difficulty, of the guy being broke, doesn’t influence. For instance, that thing: “Oh, the guy was poor, but he managed to write a genius 800 hundred pages book” – I preferred that he wasn’t poor. My political platform is in agreement with that thing – I think that’s from my great Luiz Melodia – that says: “Light to all”. I think that was it, it must have been light to all. I don’t think that issues like: “Ah, because the guy doesn’t have money he fought for it and managed to write a great book” does it. If only he had money he could have written a great book. Difficulty doesn’t do that, doesn’t make the work of art bigger. Nor does difficulty makes bigger their biography: “No, that guy used to be poor…”. I think that in the future, as I imagine it, there won’t be this thing of the guy’s biography influencing his work. Nor his political view: I think a right wing author can be a great author. A right wing composer can be a great composer, what’s the problem? Because the esthetical issues interest me. Of course I won’t write a right wing song, because I’m not right wing, but I won’t judge the work of art under this point of view.

Musical Background

Upgrading

At the time I was in college, when I met the Clube da Esquina people, I was a guy who would write songs and search melodies. Basically it. And also I was interested in everything that happened. I knew more about people’s lives than they properly knew, because I paid attention to everything, I would go to every event.

People

Luís Cláudio Ramos

And I had already had a few partners. After that partner in Colégio Pedro II, there was a guy named Luís Cláudio Ramos, who is a great violinist and arranjador – and it’s the guy that made Chico Buarque’s last album, with whom he plays. He’s an outstanding musician – and that was my first upgrade, when I met a guy who could play really well the guitar. For a while I composed with Luís Cláudio, and I met some other music people from Rio de Janeiro. I met Danilo Caymmi, Antonio Adolfo, these guys that were around this thing – and I there, wanting to write and to show my songs.

Places Rio de Janeiro

Teatro Jovem

In Teatro Jovem – which was a small theater made by a guy named Cleber Santos – happened many things in Rio de Janeiro. It was in Botafogo, where there’s a viaduct and a school beside, a place impossible to get to today. There happened “Rosa de Ouro” (“Golden Rose”), I saw many things there… and there were some nights that were for composers’ performances. So, for instance, I saw my idol, Edu Lobo, for the first time, in this place. I saw there Gilberto Gil’s first performance – when he came to Rio and played songs like “Lunik 9”, “Procissão” (“Procession”)… I would go to this night gigs, because I live nearby, in Voluntários da Pátria. I think I already knew Novelli, because I left one of these meetings and went to a bar where I met a guy named Milton Nascimento.

People

Bituca (Milton Nascimento)

I had been to Recife and gone to some people’s house, in the middle of the night, and had met my great friend Cafi, who is a photographer, someone very important in my story and in Clube da Esquina’s story. We went to a party at someone’s house and we listened to Elis Regina’s first album, which had “Canção do Sal” (“Salt Song”). And I listened to that song so much that I think I broke the guy’s LP, I listened to it thousands of times. And I was very intrigued by that: “How does that guy do it? Who is this guy that writes songs like this?”. And that stuck in my head. Later, in 67, when Milton had already had three songs getting in the Festival of Song and people would only talk about it – at least people with the same interests as me would only talk about it -, I arrived in the bar, I think I already knew Novelli, and Milton was with him drinking. I arrived and was introduced, but at the time I didn’t see who it was. Later I found out who it was, and I think that, the minute we saw each other, we made friends with each other. Then we already started to be together, we soon went to a party, spent all night up, those things…

Cities

Rio de Janeiro

It was good in the past; when we would spend all night up, see the dawn. I remember Baixo Leblon. The day would break, I would wait for the waiters, then I would go to another bar. It was good to see the sun rise. They say it’s very good for the health to se the sunrise and sunset. Then I met Milton, we became friends.

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Origin of the Clube

Soon after, I got very sick – Marcinho Borges tells in his book this story. I’m used to saying that I met Clube da Esquina in bed. I lived with my brothers in a big apartment, in Voluntários da Pátria. In my house, all friends would come in and come out… and Bituca joined us and started to go there. Everyday he would show up with someone and introduce me; I was in bed and I said: “Nice to meet you…” I was introduced to Marcinho Borges, to Lô, to the guys. It was like that. In fact, I think we were all soul mates concerning things like that, common interests for Cinema Novo, for Bossa Nova, especially for the change of the world and for music, poetry, all these things. And we met, mixed, in a way that, without plan, without theory, without a thing, we became just one thing. We created esthetics without thinking about it. We were young and what we really wanted was to change the world.

Places Rio de Janeiro

Beach House Mar Azul, Niterói

I was a fulltime activist – probably a 24/7 activist – of Clube da Esquina. Some people did other things, I was in college, but I was there; I went to Mar Azul and I lived there. I remember much the feeling of that time. We were in a house that looked like summer camp, because the house had several bedrooms and stories, in a place with a beautiful view, in a beautiful place. I went there the other day and today there are many houses, but at our time there was practically nothing. You would stay there a little isolated. You would leave the house and stand on sand, the shower was in a place full of trees – that’s a little of my childhood, this thing of standing on the ground. We would wake up at any time, then would find out what to eat, I mean, it was free. I think I was the guy who led this process the most, because at the time it had to be me. It’s not that I led it, but I was there and there was more of this thing: “So now we’ll do I this…” But the most of planning we had was this: me being annoying. The rest was to play, to chat, to read without planning it; we knew we were doing something.

Albums

“Clube da Esquina”

During the whole Clube da Esquina process, we knew we were making a record, which was a record that would mean something. There were several sides. We would listen to some albums, including “Tommy”, from The Who. And there was this thing of doing something that meant something.

Songs

“O Trem Azul” (“The Blue Train”)

A funny story from Clube da Esquina is that once a stoned guy knocked on my door, came from I don’t know where and said: “No, because you wrote that song called ‘O Trem Azul’, and now I’m doing acid and I’m here to trip…” I said: “Man, there’s nothing to do with it. ‘O Trem Azul’ was a real train, got it? It really existed. Don’t do this to me, that’s your problem”

Work

Professional Activities

At a certain point, I already started to exercise a little this thing of making an album as a work of art – which is one of the few things I think I can do well. I think that I started to have the notion of the cover, the order. And there I put myself in this role to organize, as possible, the mess – making a mess too. And I remember one day, in Belo Horizonte, in family (Fernando) Brant’s house, Bituca said to me: “Now you lead the process, you’re the man” – something like that – “From now on, you make the deal”. Then I became a little more annoying.

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Origin of the Clube

We created a very big intimacy. I mean, before I went to Belo Horizonte. Clube da Esquina is many people, the ones that wrote the songs, and recorded them, and everyone else. Each one has their own Clube da Esquina. And we created an intimacy. Before I came to Belo Horizonte – because of these diseases I had – I had already had news from the thing there because my brother had been to Belo Horizonte and knew about Paulo and Cláudio, who were twins, about Benjamin, there was also a group of people that had already been to Belo Horizonte for New Year, they drank a lot, I don’t know… so we were close.

People

Brant Family

And when I came to Belo Horizonte, still convalescing from this whole thing, the first place I went to was in Grão Pará Street, to the Brant family’s house – where lived 11 brothers and practically everybody lived there. There was some stairs, the boys’ room, those queued beds… And I would go to Belo Horizonte, first to the Brant’s, then to the Borges’, then to Murilo’s – that was in successive times. I would spend two months living in someone’s house, go back… But that wasn’t just in Belo Horizonte; we would take the bus and say: “Let’s go to São Paulo” – and would go there. We created a very big intimacy. Clube da Esquina had many people at that time, many people.

People

Bituca

The center of what I call Clube da Esquina were young composers, musicians, who got together through the love for that music, who got together around a catalyst figure, called Milton Nascimento. Bituca, for those who don’t know him, is a person that, if he comes here now, it’s going to be impossible not to pay attention to him. He has that thing. When I met him, in these nights I mentioned before, I went to a party with him where everyone would talk about him and nobody knew him. It was a party at conductor Erlon Chaves’ house, where there were Dori Caymmi, Edu Lobo, Francis, several music people, all those guys… At the time he started to play, people stayed still, because it was a song that we would fall in love for it. So, Clube da Esquina is a thing united around this music, this guy and his strength. And from that moment on I believe that he has also transformed, because, with this intimacy, we created something that, in a certain point, was like it was only one thing.

Albums

“Clube da Esquina”

So when we were making the album, as it was only one thing, I already started to allow myself to organize the matters of the album. What I kept doing afterwards, in Beto Guedes’ album, for instance, was saying: “No, there’s much of the word ‘heart’ in this album. Let’s see which one is better… Change this song” – I mean, I interfered, I changed the people’s lyrics or I asked them to change it. Clube da Esquina, the center, is Milton Nascimento, Márcio Borges, Fernando Brant, me, Lô Borges, Beto Guedes, Toninho Horta, Wagner Tiso, Robertinho Silva, Nelson Angelo, Danilo Caymmi, Joyce, Nivaldo Ornelas, Novelli, Luíz Alves, the whole Som Imaginário, the brothers Paulo and Cláudio – this among the musicians. There were also Cafi, Vicente, the Borges family, the Brant family and all. At this time there was also Jacaré.

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: assessment

When Lô and Beto came, we were a Brazilian music people coming from bossa nova. The second generation – after bossa nova – already listened to Beatles and Rolling Stones, I mean, listened to the pop music of the time – now is total cult – but listened to pop music, it was curious. Apart from the things we listened before, which were jazz, the great female singers, all Brazilian music. The only thing I wrote – because I don’t write anything – about Clube da Esquina was called “The Beatles were Rolling Stones”. This second generation, these people we like to this day and have always liked, were really attached to this thing about the seriousness of Brazilian music, having to wear a tuxedo to go to the Municipal (Theater). And we were really rolling stones, we were much more Rolling Stones. When Clube da Esquina happened, an article came out saying: “These are the Brazilian Beatles”. And it’s kind of true, because in a way we behaved a little as if we were the Brazilian Beatles. We didn’t have money, but we behaved in the Brazilian show business as absolute superstars – even if nobody knew it, and it’s like this to this day. To this day they don’t know that Clube da Esquina is a cool thing. To this day there’s something like this: Bossa Nova, Tropicalismo, later the 80’s generation and that’s over. But to this day we behave as a Beatle; I used to say back then: “There’s George, Paul, Ringo and Ronaldo. I’m Ronaldo” Because we were like this, we wanted to do something else.

People

Lô Borges / Beto Guedes

Lô and Beto came all ready to the Clube, with another information; but they would stand there seeing us, so they were already doing that thing we had.

People

Caetano Veloso

It’s funny, because the only guy that talks about Clube da Esquina – other than me, I say it and recover it in every interview – in a proper was is Caetano Veloso, who is a “tropicalist”. And he speaks with sagacity. I consider Caetano Veloso the greatest music reviewer in activity; I think he’s insuperable as a reviewer. Because he has sagacity, he has something that later became institutionalized. Seem like Clube da Esquina was something kind of sacred, kind of I don’t know what. When, in fact, it wasn’t. And we had many things in common; some ideas were common, because they were ideas common to young people that thought, so much in Santo Amaro da Purificação as in anywhere else. For instance, Caetano reminded me the other day that I met him before I met Milton. I was a friend of Torquato Neto’s before I met Clube da Esquina.

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Assessment

We were in college, we did student politics and there were things like this: we saw that left wing was square and that right wing wasn’t possible. We were there, in the path to the transformation of the world. And Clube da Esquina was that. And did it through music, with musical quality, unseen in the ideological movement until then. In other words, it was a movement without ever being a movement; it was something that had a plan without ever having had a plan. And basically at that moment, without us theorizing much, but knowing a little what we were doing, we behaved regarding the music we were making like this: “We are making the best music anyone’s making right here, right now. And that was it”. Then came Tavinho, Murilo, Flávio Venturini – but that’s another generation.

Cities

Paris

Then I moved to Paris. There was this process of letter here, letter there, other information…

People

Márcio Borges/ Murilo Antunes

Then, Marcinho got married, and there was a time that I went to Marcinho’s house. He got married and I moved in with him – that’s absurd, isn’t that? You looking at it today say: “Wow, man What an annoying guy”; but we were like that. After Murilo got married, I also spent some time there.

People

Wagner Tiso

I think Wagner Tiso is a key guy for Clube da Esquina, although he wasn’t there at this moment that people were living kind of together, in this Bituca’s successive houses. Apart from the people who were fulltime on the tatame – there were some tatames that followed us; we would have lunch, dinner, we would sleep on it. There were other people, like Som Imaginário’s guys – but I think Wagner especially was a center person in the creation, in the sonority of Clube da Esquina.

People

Tavito

Tavito, who I forgot to mention, is also very important; there was Tavito’s viola. Zé Rodrix too, at Som Imaginário’s time. Not so much in Clube da Esquina.

Albums

“Clube da Esquina”

I participated in the creation of the cover of the album Clube da Esquina, but I didn’t sign it. Then I started to sign some covers with Cafi, even because I survived for a long time designing album covers – at that time, my songs hadn’t been recorded yet and copyright was more precarious than it is today. You know that thing about Woody Allen, who is a great moviemaker but always wants to be recognized as a musician? I’m a songwriter who always wants to be recognized as a cover designer. I was looking at some pictures the other day and I said to Cafi, who is a great photographer: “No, Cafi, come off it… You’re a great photographer, but I’m a great cover designer”. I know what a record cover is about, and I know how to do something I call production design – this phrase didn’t exist, but I think that’s what I do. I love independent albums, independent people; I like shoddy things. I have nothing against, I like rolling stones. But I know how to make an album without losing what’s inside it, and get to the market looking like market, standing there in the shop windows beside Madonna – and it can be a fife band from Caruaru. I know how to design a cover for it to go together and for it not to look like an independent album. Nothing against independent album, on the contrary – I’m even in the Association of Independent Producers -, but independent albums look like independent albums. An independent album is that where the guy thanks God, his mother, his whole family, his dog… and the cover is always like that, it looks like that.

Another thing I learned doing was being a producer. I mean, the first time I walked in a studio was during the recording of Bituca’s first album, soon after I met him; it was that “Travessia” album, which he recorded with Tamba Trio, with arrangements by Luiz Eça. I was amazed But later, when he changed to Odeon, which was the first big label where he did his work, including “Clube da Esquina 2”, I wasn’t so confident in the studio. Everyday you have to leave your ID; there were people that could get straight in and there were the ones who had to leave their ID. Then I became the guy that could get in, only that I went there everyday – I became an employee. I worked for almost ten years for EMI without ever having a job. In the end, when I wanted things, I would take a memo, a document from someone’s office, and I would climb down the stairs and said: “Sign it”. Then I would come back and say: “It’s signed”. Because I wanted to do things, so I would do this. And I became a producer because I went much to the studio; I would go to EMI everyday. In the end, I think I even slept there, had a toothbrush, a change of clothes. Even because, there was a time when I lived in Santa Teresa, and there was no van, nothing – you had to leave the house and plan everything you would do, including how to go back home when you couldn’t, because I didn’t have enough money for the taxi, and taxis wouldn’t want to climb in the middle of the night. So I lived there. And then I became a producer. I think producers come from different backgrounds, but basically there are the guys that are musicians, arranjadores, and there are the ones that are more connected to technology, they know all about sound. I’m not a musician, in this way, because I don’t play absolutely anything, I don’t know music, I have no musical education. And also I don’t know anything about technology, although I’m totally in favor of it – I’m Aquarius and in favor of technology, even though I think technology doesn’t give light to a blind man too, it doesn’t work. But it’s good, it’s cool. And I stayed there. First it was by elimination; it was kind of: “Stay there, hang in there”. And I think I had a virtue in this process, which is this: I’m a guy that let people work. I can be in a studio and have a presence – the guy comes in and knows I’m a producer – but at the same time I’m not that producer that pushes the button all the time and says to Wagner Tiso, for instance: “Look, Wagner…”. Because, well, first because I don’t have to; second, because if the guy is there recording, I’m not the one to tell him his violin is out of tune – he already knows it He records it again, goes back… so everyone did everything, and I conducted that process. And I allowed myself to do this thing that was to organize the work of art; I think an album is a work of art that is worth, in fact, as much as a Picasso, a Matisse. The difference is that one costs 10 million dollars and the other costs 10 dollars. But, actually, if you make a whole album, where everything works, it’s the same value. And I pursued the perfect vibe to create this thing and I became a music producer. And I improved this thing of knowing how to make the cover and picking the artists. So I let people work.

Albums/ People

“Clube da Esquina” / Cafi

About the cover of “Clube da Esquina 1”, at that time I moved out home and went to live with Cafi, who had gotten married. We were starting our lives, we didn’t have any money, struggling. And we were completely involved in this Clube da Esquina story. So there was something that was: we would manage to get some money to buy films and photograph everything; the images we have from that time are most these pictures that Cafi took. We went everywhere by beetle – the great importance of Clube da Esquina is the beetle, which is one of the fundamental elements from that time – and we would go to the places to photograph all things that were happening, in each one of these houses, everything. And, especially, we had a thing back then that was to photograph the perfect cloud – there’s even one of these pictures in “Clube da Esquina”, that later, in “Clube da Esquina 2”, is in the label. We would photograph perfect clouds and mambembe Circuses, because with the circus we had a book project – which we never did. So we would hit the roads looking for circuses and clouds. Where my parents lived, there was a farm and everyone would go there. We would leave somewhere: “Let’s go to Friburgo”. And we were already looking for a house; we were already in this Clube da Esquina process. And that picture was the following: we were in the beetle, in a road, and there were two kids sitting there. I stopped the car and said – I don’t know if it was me or Cafi that said: “Photograph this”. And he photographed, through the window, from inside the beetle; we photographed and left. It was another picture like the ones we used to take – that later became the cover picture. Then Cafi called Nogushi, who was a guy that was also introduced to me by Márcio Borges, and who was a fundamental person in this concept, just like Kélio Rodrigues. I learned much in this time in my graphic arts idea, with books, with the things they made. And also in life. Cafi called Nogushi to make the inscription – the “Clube da Esquina” lettering – and he was a incredible master to us.

Albums

“Clube da Esquina”

The album “Clube da Esquina” was something out of the parameters of everything – including the audio. The other day Lenine said that to me. Lenine was “audiophile” in Pernambuco, but he would only listen to imported albums, because national albums were poorly pressed, and, usually, poorly recorded. If you take, with very rare exceptions, the albums from that time, like albums from the beginning of the Tropicalismo, are cool albums and all, but the audio… And he said that the first thing that brought him near Brazilian music was “Clube da Esquina” because, when he listened to it, there was a recording audio, in all senses. The recording was really fine back then. The recording was, maybe, with the technology of the time, better than it is today, to my audio standard. Because, also, with this producer thing, I became – without also being an expert – a guy connected to masterização, to the audio, the quality, this entire thing. And I have been doing this today, which is to masterizar the albums from the past with original audio, cool audio, with all the technology we have today but without making up. So there was something that had audio, that had music, it was the mix of everything that was there. There was a poetry thing – in this meaning of words – that was totally different than everything that was and than everything that had been. I mean, there was a language of its own, there were words of its own, and, besides, it had a cover that didn’t bring the artist’s name, besides it was a double record. I remember when “Clube da Esquina” was recorded in EMI, which at the time was the label that had all great Brazilian artists.

People

Milton Miranda

And there was a genius guy, named Milton Miranda, who was the artistic director. One day, he stopped my in the corridor to talk about something that was happening and I, using all my power of seduction, said: “My love… Believe, let’s go”. And he stared at me… But it was the way. Bituca didn’t sell albums yet. But the labels still invested in the guy, recorded the albums. Only it was crazy, because it was a double record, the cover was two boys, it didn’t have the artist’s name – the names were in the back of the album, and they were the name of the artist and the name of another one that nobody had invited, actually, because he didn’t have a contract. So it was an album totally out of the ordinary. Including, the album was not supposed to be called “Clube da Esquina”, it was supposed to be called “Documento Secreto” (Secret Document) – I think I was the one to make this name go away. I don’t remember properly, but the way I am, I must have said: “No, just put ‘Clube da Esquina’ that is good”. I don’t know exactly who mentioned the name “Clube da Esquina”, but it was so obvious. Because there was a song called “Clube da Esquina” it had to be called “Clube da Esquina”, right? Because it means that corner, at the time we hung around there, but it also mean a lot of other corners, a lot of other clubs too. But it was something done without media, without programming, without a manager, without a theory.

People

Nivaldo Duarte

I think Nivaldo Duarte was an important guy to Clube da Esquina. He was one of the recording experts, who had a job in the label, got a paycheck, and recorded wonderfully well, because he recorded through his ears and not through the machine. Nivaldo Duarte, this guy who recorded “Clube da Esquina”, tells a wonderful story. He said that it was like this: we would come in, that bunch of long-haired guys, would sit there and rehearse – because at that time there weren’t many channels, there wasn’t this thing of 16 channels, so you had to record almost everything at the same time and then sum the channels. And while you played, the guy would start to understand what was about to happen and started to microfonar. The guys would play for hours – the labels back then had a studio. Then Nivaldo Duarte would say: “Well, okay. Now everything is ready, I’ve already microfonei, let’s record”, and the guys would say to him: “No, but that’s not the song we’re going to record; we were just writing this song. We’re going to record another song” – from this story, you can see how the environment in the recording of “Clube da Esquina” was…

People

“Bituca” (Milton Nascimento)

Bituca’s shows that lasted three, four months at the same theater –in the past there was this thing too - were a daily program. You would arrive early, talk, the show would start, you would watch the show, and then you would stay in front of the theater at least twice the duration of the show. And that was everyday. Now, in the recording it kept the same thing, because the recording turned into a great thing to do: “What are you doing today?” “I’m going to the recording of ‘Clube da Esquina’”. So, you had – in “Clube da Esquina 1” not so much, but there still was – what was going on in the studio and what was going on around, the girlfriends, the friends… it was kind of a party, in fact.

Albums

“Geraes”

In the recording of the album “Geraes”, I remember that, after we recorded with Grupo Água, we took everything that was in the studio out, leaned that against the walls, and had a party. We danced all night long. Cafi has some pictures of people moving, pretty.

Musical Background

Compositions

Socorros Costa is something there is in Belo Horizonte, I didn’t know it, but Marcinho and Murilo Antunes taught me later. They made this name up, which was a real tow truck, a crane, already at a time of Beto Guedes’ albums, at a time we applied this method in Beto’s albums. We were Marcinho, Murilo and I – we were basically writing all songs of the album. There was a thing of the record to have unity, which is very hard, because sometimes you take a record and there’s the word “God” 30 times – then the guy thinks it’s a gospel album. But no, it’s because they’re different writers, with the same worries, everyone in a religious crisis, they everyone would go “God”, “God”… So we, to avoid that – me in a more dictatorial way, because I was the producer -, started to interfere soon: “No, that won’t do”. But Marcinho reminded me that Socorros Costa appeared before the name, according to him, in “Vera Cruz”, which he had written several pages, several attempts and he couldn’t finish it. I mean, there were too much lyric. And Bituca took, in Belo Horizonte, this bunch of sheets, brought to Rio, handed it over to me and said: “Make it work.” I think it was the beginning, I think Bituca was the one that started this thing. And, usually, as I was here and Marcinho and Fernando in Belo Horizonte, I was in charge. Or maybe because I at the time I was very technical.

People

Caetano Veloso/ João Donato

I became a partner of Caetano Veloso and João Donato, totally involuntarily. I had a tape from João Donato, who sang lyrics that Caetano was already writing with him, and there were two sentences in the middle. I, already addicted to this Socorros Costa thing, was singing the song and rewrote the two sentences. Then I said to Caetano: Man, there’s a beautiful song you are writing…”. And I sang to him, but I sang with the two sentences of mine, but I didn’t mean it. Then, Caetano, with his manner: “But we’ve known each other for so many years… Let’s be partners, because I’m a songwriter and you are one too” – then I became a partner. I always say I didn’t do anything in this song, but I became a partner.

Work

Professional Activities

From Clube da Esquina I’m a fan of Fernando and Marcinho – especially Marcinho, that baroque thing. As a songwriter, I don’t have millions of ideas; sometimes I have half an idea and stay there, “caymming” that, until it turns into a song. So that ended up creating that legend that I’m a precise guy. Or maybe because of that thing: “Work it out, fix this thing” – even though there was nothing to be fixed, because the lyrics were genius and were already ready. I, actually, organized because there were too much lyrics in a melody that didn’t fit it all; I cut from there, took from there, I don’t know if I did good.

Songs

“Nada Será Como Antes” (Nothing will be like before)

At the apartment I had on top of Bituca’s apartment, the one of the tatames, on Rebouças tunnel, we could see the Corcovado rock and we would stay there staring at the rock. I had to write the lyrics for “Nada Será Como Antes” – because there was going to be something, I don’t know if it was the recording of the album or some festival – and Beto, especially, wanted to sing that song. I know there was a tiny little maid’s room, and they locked me up there. They said: “Now you do it” – and I stayed locked in the maid’s room with millions of stuff and some old suitcases. I didn’t have what to do. I opened one suitcase and lyrics started to come out. Then I – in this addiction to organize everything – organized that. And there were the lyrics for “San Vicente”, by Milton and Fernando Brant. In order to make them let me out of the room, I said: “Let me out ‘cause I have lyrics all done” – and I came out with the lyrics for “San Vicente”. Then I got back, grounded, to write the lyrics…

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Assessment

When I say we were rolling stones, we were really rolling stones. There was a time when I was kind of in the crossroads, because due to this role in Clube da Esquina, of being the guy who organizes things, there was a time when I said: “I’m going to become the boring manager of this story. I’m out of this”. But I still participated in some disastrous attempts to find Bituca a manager, who backfired. Because everything was very shoddy. But I think that the “Clube da Esquina” release was at the Fonte da Saudade Theater – today it’s a theater that nobody goes, I don’t even know if it exists. It was a show that had a scenario, it had a director – I think it was Ruy Guerra – and it was cool. I think, basically, what happened back then is that everything could happen in the show. And what happened, from there, is that Clube da Esquina was the first to become popular with the kids. And the audience started to be of 14, 15, 16, 17 years olds… It changed because I think they related to the music, the poetry, the way we were – the way we were longhaired guys… So, with Bituca, it was the first time I ever saw great shows in Brazil. When the rock generation came, we had the whole thing organized: the guy already knew what to do when they got to the studio, already knew what to do when he came to publish the song. But we spent ten years without publishing our songs, until we got how it was; when we got how it was like, we made the first songwriter’s publishing company of Brazil.

Work

Assessment

As I’m very curious about other things, when the boys came, unlike MPB, which turned the back, we were totally open, and I, particularly, was very open to the rock generation. Rock generation was funny… the guys came in and they kind of didn’t care, saying: “MPB… This Chico Buarque is old”. Then, what I thought boring was starting to play mea culpa and say: “No, Herivelto Martins is a genius”. Then they got too MPB… but when rock came, I said: “I want to see this”. I remember that Chico Buarque, in these class meetings, would call me and say: “You know this rock people, bring whatever.” Because I met the rock people; I was friends with Renato Russo, with the guys from Paralamas. I went there: “I want to meet these guys who are there”. But when they got to EMI, which was a barn for that, the rock vibe was already ready.

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Assessment

Clube da Esquina, at its 25th anniversary, didn’t have much. The most it had was a thing in Jornal do Brasil that said: “Minas Gerais’ Sargent Peppers”. I said: “Why Minas Gerais’ Sargent Peppers? So every time one talks about Lupicínio Rodrigues, they have to say ‘the composer from Rio Grande do Sul?’”. Once I was having a picture taken for Revista da Folha, talking a little about this to the reporter and to the girl who was taking the pictures – who is today a great photographer in São Paulo, Rochelle Costi – and she said: “It’s funny… the same people who say those things are the people who used to hire kombis to go to Beto Guedes’ show” – because it’s the same thing. It was good, but it’s like a boutique dark, something like that.

Albums

“Cais” (Quay)

I remember when I released “Cais”. I used to say: “How am I supposed to release that? Because I can’t say ‘You know, Silvio, I’m coming here now…”. Then I said: “I’m going to not care…”. I know that the guy came to interview me; he got there, a super-reporter, a nice guy. He arrived at my house at three o’clock in the afternoon, expecting to meet a hippie from Clube da Esquina – nothing against the hippies, I love them, I don’t have a problem with anything, everything is liberated – and we stopped at three o’clock in the morning the next day Because the guy, when he arrived, he said: “What’s ‘quay’ for you?” I could have told him: “The quay is the place, the cliff where my soul is projected…” but I told him: “’Cais’ is a place in São Paulo I go to, which opens at three in the morning; I go there with Cazuza and we go first to ‘Cais’, then to ‘Vão Improviso’”. The guy said: “What? Wait a second, reprocess it…”

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Assessment

There were Chico’s deposition saying I was an adorable creature; Renato Russo said that the day he met me he got on his knees. I said: “Well, as we have always behaved like this, we keep on behaving…” – as a majesty, thing we didn’t realize at the time. This is a prejudice relating Clube da Esquina – this thing is often attributed, and I disagree with it. Sometimes, Fernando talks about it, about us not having either organization or a media plan. Because it’s too easy to say: “No, it didn’t happen because of that”. I think that’s because we did something like this: first, Clube da Esquina was a audience phenomenon – Bituca and Clube da Esquina were a huge audience phenomenon for the kids at that time. Clube da Esquina is what made the appearance of a generation of rockers with all they behavior inherited possible. There’s a song by Herbert, beautiful, where the electric guitar intro is pure Lô Borges, the guys even say it.

People

Caetano Veloso

Caetano said something marvelous to me. He said that a guy wrote a book called “The beautiful decadence of samba” – it’s a queer they have in Folha de São Paulo -, a whole book to prove the epic heterosexuality of Caetano. Then Caetano said: “But you wrote a whole book to prove my epic heterosexuality from your romantic homosexuality point of view?”. It’s wonderful, because the guy wastes a fucking time to write a book no one’s interested in, and when Clube da Esquina appears it is on top… “No, these guys…” I say: “Well, I don’t get it, man” – he is talking to the guys who made probably one of the most incredible stories of popular music in this country And, as Caetano said recently, at Jô’s: “No, we didn’t make any changes in music; who changed the music was Clube da Esquina”. And, recently, when he recorded this album, he said: “The two only things in Brazilian music that were fundamental to change, that somehow influenced the music in the world, were Bossa Nova and Clube da Esquina”.

Leisure

Movies

As I’m a music activist, I exercise a little of this critic thing all the time, I thing that every creator exercises it. And, besides, we’re children especially of Nouvelle Vague, Truffaut, Godard, of these guys, especially of Cinema Novo – at the time where movies would be made in Brazil, that wasn’t this movies they’re making, with rare exceptions, with public money that’s horrific.

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Assessment

I think history is the way it is, because if we had made plans, I don’t know what we would have. Because I think we never gave a damn, I say this in this article – because the only thing I ever wrote about Clube da Esquina was this. We never gave a damn to this story, and I think we still don’t. So I wasn’t going to worry now, but there are times when I say because I can’t just say: “Look, my deposition is this, Brazilian music history is not like this, it’s not how it was, it’s not like that”. When I say I was a friend of Torquato’s, that I met Caetano before I met Milton, it’s because these stories are too connected and it was no discovery for you to know that there were other things going on, that there was the mini-skirt, the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, that there was all this universe that was going on. We were young and we knew that. Only we didn’t have a plan, it wasn’t our plan, for instance, identify prejudices regarding what’s tacky and what’s not tacky – these things that Tropicalismo worked on wonderfully well.

Historical Events

Tropicalismo

Some of the achievements of Tropicalismo were great for us in the process, it gave us much freedom. But, when I saw a Globo TV show, with a female singer – that I’m not going to say the name, in order to not get very controversial – murdering a Caetano’s song on stage, and the announcer saying: “Tropicalismo changed Brazil”, then it’s time to do something. Which is not something I should do, it’s something the tropicalistas have to do – to come there, watch the show and say: “Look, I want to say something… We didn’t change any Brazil…” – even because, it lasted a couple of months. I am really sad when young artists identify themselves as Tropicalismo’s children. I’d be deeply distant from a young artist that says he’s a child from Clube da Esquina. It’s not our thing, or thing is Bob Dylan – “Don’t look back”. As in that French of people who don’t speak French, “sampre en fran”. It’s the French from the streetwise, “sampre en fran”.

People

Chacal / Charles Peixoto

In Communication school, I met some people, including poet Chacal and poet Charles Peixoto. And, at Clube da Esquina’s time, we were Beatle maniacs in the way that we also thought about doing that whole organization – in the end, we did a lot of this without this organization. But I thought about doing this, there was this idea of making “Nuvem Cigana” (Gipsy Cloud), which had this name because of a song by Lô Borges and I. And, by life’s circumstances, at a certain time, I went to live in Santa Tereza, in a house with two architects – Pedro Cascardo and Dionísio – and Lúcia, who was an engineer. It was a big house they had bought ruined, they had rebuilt and we lived there.

Cities

Rio de Janeiro

There was a carnival troupe we were part of that’s one of the origins of these troupes there are in Rio, like “Simpatia Quase Amor” (Sympathy almost love), which was “Charme de Simpatia” (Sympathy Charm), a crazy thing, which was not at carnival, on the wrong way of the street, with the cars coming and dressed in crepe paper. After we disrupted, we would jump on the beach – it was almost a flash carnival meeting we made.

Family

Parents/ Brothers

I’m a guy who’s very proud when someone says I’m from Minas. I never deny it – I say that I’m proud and that I’m really ‘mineiro’. Even because, my father was a salesman in Zona da Mata, my brothers were born in Ubá and I feel very ‘mineiro’. But I’m papa-goiaba, I’m from Niterói; but I’m too ‘carioca’ (from Rio) too, my way is very ‘carioca’.

Work

Partnerships

From the things I have been doing now with Celso Fonseca, I managed to write a trilogy where I create a character and I think I finally got it right, which is a guy that has one foot on the double-dealing and the other on grand monde, who’s a guy that’s elegant but at the same time he’s in the gutter, and sees these worlds and makes it go.

So, at that time, I got into this soccer story, samba, Santa Teresa, with these friends. I didn’t have a place to live and I ended up there. And Marcinho, too, moved to Santa Teresa later. We had parties that lasted three days, it was wonderful.

Work

Writing activity

We were having the duplicating machine generation, and I published one thing called “Canção de Búzios” (Búzios’ song). It’s a little book I wrote with the memories of a time I spent in Búzios, kind of idle, at the time when Búzios was Búzios. I went there the other day and I said: “Wow, that’s horrible”. I left in a rush… But the first one to write a book in the duplicating machine was Chacal, called “Muito Prazer, Chacal” (Pleasure, Chacal). There was this duplicating machine thing, and “Nuvem Cigana” kind of had this party-ish thing; we were kind of “happening”, it was the opposite. And at the time I was fragilized, because I was completely introspective. This was a possibility, because these guys are outgoing guys, they speak loud, soccer, I don’t know what, and I jumped in, which was my survival, it was my return to life, it was my health. So there was this “Nuvem Cigana” thing, which was to produce, to organize – it was a disorder, never-ending meetings -, on the pretext of releasing some albums, some books we would publish. We did great happenings in Rio de Janeiro; crazy happenings, with staging, with crazy parties. And, actually, there was everything in “Nuvem Cigana”… There were parties at my house that I would leave in the middle of the party, go to Friburgo and come back three days later and the party was still happening. There were from the guy from the slum to the Tom Jobim. Everybody went there. In the middle of the party I would go to the beach, and there would be someone talking about the party: “No, because I went to a party at Ronaldo Bastos’ house” – only nobody knew who I was, it wasn’t even my house. I was there, it was a party… Then it became this thing, the “Nuvem Cigana” house. “Nuvem” (Cloud) because it was something that moves, that’s in movement.

People

Tom Jobim

I think I was more of a friend of Tom Jobim’s than a partner. I met Tom Jobim, who was already an absolut myth to Brazil and to me, introduced by Bituca, who took me to Tom’s house. And he happened to like me and I started to visit his house frequently. And Tom was a very important guy in my background, in every sense. He was fundamental in my background. And there was this thing of writing songs, because I was a songwriter, partner of Milton Nascimento.

Songs

“Wave”

In “Wave”, I tried to write the lyrics and, actually, Tom was already writing it, he had several things ready. But one of my biggest prides in popular music is to have put the word “cais” in “Wave”. Every time somebody says “O cais é a eternindade” (The quay is eternity), that was me. So I was a partner of Tom only in this word I put.

People

Paulinho Jobim

But Tom had the wisdom to push it one time. Paulinho was sick, upstairs, he had the flu, and he said: “You have to meet my son”, that way of his. He took me there to Paulinho and I became a partner of Paulinho and started to be his friend; and it became sort of a family thing. I mean, I had more of this privilege in my life, other than the Borges Family, the Brant Family, the Caymmi Family.

People

Caymmi Family

The other day I mocked Nana Caymmi. I kindly call Nana Caymmi “mummy”, and Mrs. Estela, Nana Caymmi’s mother, calls me “my brother”. Then I came to a party and said: “Nana, if your mother is my sister and you are my mother, what are your relation to me after all?”.

I was lucky to be able to live so much with our Dorival, as with our Antonio Carlos.

People

Tom Jobim

But the partnership with Tom is a small partnership for the time we actually spent together. I had written a song with Paulinho, called “Maria é dia” (Maria is day), but we had never written a song together. Then Tom went there with Paulinho and wrote some bits, wrote some parts of the lyrics. Because, in fact, he wanted to do this partnership thing we had planned years before. There was a time when I lived with Tom in a house in London; first he by himself and then with his family. Then, soon after that, we met in Paris. And I have an unpublished song with him. He didn’t record it. It was a song he recorded instrumental, called “Teresa my love”, and I don’t know how it’s called in Portuguese. Later, he asked me to do that miniseries from Globo TV, “O Tempo e o Vento” (The time and the wind), to write some songs with him, which are the three songs in this miniseries.

Musical Background

Clube da Esquina: Museum

I think it’s wonderful this initiative of the Clube da Esquina museum. I think it’s especially wonderful to rescue the spirit of this thing, in a way that Clube da Esquina will be for everyone. I think it has to be a museum turned to the future, with forwarding eyes. It has to be at an imaginary space, in an imaginary time, in the future; now, but for the future, to be there. And to have a thing that people, physically, could come in a place that has a new face, that has a new architecture – that’s not a building that the city hall had somewhere, that’s this thing. I know that it’s not its spirit, but I see it very clearly, starting from the space. It has to be something completely daring. I think that our music is very connected to our architecture, with our movies, and especially with the people. With Brazilian people and with earthlings, at least while they still don’t know the Martians, the Venus people…