Brazilian Music on Radio

 What is Brazilian music?  There is not a single asnwer, as there are many types of Brazilian music.  The Grammy Guide to Latin Music offers these definitions:

• Samba is characterized by a 2/4 meter, and simple rhythms woven into a dense, intricate and interlocking textures and a call-and-response structure.  It emerged as an urban style in Rio de Janeiro in the 1910s.  The samba that evokes images of carnival and large samba schools --- with their floats and hundres of drummers on parade performing a song with a narrative --- is known as samba as enredo.  But there are other samba styles such as the samba canção, a slower, softer, more sentimental samba; the samba do morro, an earthier, heavily percussive, neighborhood samba; and the samba reggae, which takes on the reggae backbeat.
• Pagode draws strongly from classic samba roots but updates them with earthy lyrics, refreshing pop production and surprising instrumental twists. Pagode's origins can be traced to a series of mid-1970s jam sessions frequented by musicians gathering for Rio's Carnaval. Contemporary pagode has a more pop-ish sound, with a touch of Brazilian soul and R&B, and feature keyboards and electric guitar and bass.
• MPB (Música Popular Brasileira) is an umbrella term for contemporary Brazilian pop music. It also refers specifically to a generation of musicians and songwriters who rose to prominence in Brazil in the late 1960s and early 1970s, a time of political turmoil in the country and under a military dictatorship that lasted 22 years. This, in fact, helped turn MPB into much more than just another let's-have-a-good-time rock and pop movement. Esthetically, MPB covers a broad spectrum, from literate ballads to inspired, mad blends of indigenous music with Anglo pop and rock. Far from being a '60s artifact, MPB is still a vital form today.
• Música sertaneja, or simply sertanejo, is a type of regional country music from Brazil that, in recent years, has enjoyed great national popularity and record sales. Critic Antonio Carlos Miguel notes that sertanejo is rooted in música caipira, the acoustic country music of Southeast and Central Brazil, and that while it was originally characterized by naïve lyrics about romance and rural life, sertanejo has, in recent decades, incorporated the influences of guarânia music from Paraguay, Mexican mariachi music and North American country music.
• Axé music means "Good luck", a strong will and faith, and is the dance music that originated from the Baia region of Brazil.  The music contains elements of Brazilian rhythms, afoxe, frevo, ijexa, samba reggae, lambada, rock and merengue..

We will now cite some survey data from the 2003 TGI Brasil study.  This is a survey of 10,624 Brazilians between the ages of 12 to 64 years old who were interviewed during 2003.  During the survey process, these respondents were shown a list of radio program genres and they indicated the following:

• 32% said that they frequently listened to MPB
• 32% said that they frequently listened to axé/música baiana
• 25% said that they frequently listened to sertanejo
• 32% said that they frequently listened to samba/pagode

In the following chart, we show the incidences by age/sex groups.  The patterns are actually fairly different among these four musical genres.  For MPB, the profile tends to be middle-aged among males and younger among females.  For axé/música baiana, the profile is distinctly younger and female.  For sertanejo, the profile is older.  For samba/pagode, the profile is younger females.  It would appear that the females are more likely to prefer the dance music of axé/música baiana, and samba/pagode.

(data source: 2003 TGI Brasil)

In the next chart, we show the incidences by socio-economic levels.  Here, MPB has the exact opposite profiles as the other three musical genres.

(data source: 2003 TGI Brasil)

The same pattern is repeated in the next chart, which shows the profiles by educational level.  In addition, we also note that the profiles for axé/música baiana and samba/pagode are inverted U-shape curves with dips at the lower end of the educational scale.

(data source: 2003 TGI Brasil)

(posted by Roland Soong, 11/16/2003)