Bridging Disciplinary Divides in the Study of Brazilian Instrumental Music

Academic and popular investigation of Brazilian popular music has burgeoned in recent years. In keeping with trends of cultural and political pluralization throughout Brazil, recent scholarship has expanded dramatically in its range—from the sacred music of umbanda rituals in Porto Alegre to the history of Paraense pop, Brazilian music is under investigation.¹

Although most recent work is inherently interdisciplinary, drawing on methodologies and ideas from musicology, ethnomusicology, anthropology, history, literature and political science, to list the most obvious participating disciplines, the publication and dissemination of this work still tends to conform to disciplinary boundaries. Historians publish in history journals, anthroplogists publish in anthropology journals, and although Google Scholar, JSTOR and Project Muse make nearly everything instantly searchable, cross-fertilization is still more likely to happen out in the field than in the conference room or editorial process. The Luso-Brazilian Review represents an ideal forum for interdisciplinary work on Brazilian music.

The gap between musicologists and ethnomusicologists on one hand and scholars from all other disciplines on the other is particularly vexing, for several reasons. To begin, this work has expanded dramatically in recent years—the Brazilianist faction of the Society for Ethnomusicology is now one of the most vital and productive subsectors of that association. Because many musicologists and ethnomusicologists either remain professional musicians or are teaching in programs that do not emphasize publication, much of this work remains unpublished. But it deserves to be read by scholars from other disciplines, not only for its rich analyses of Brazilian musical practices, but for the paths it opens up for broader investigations of Brazilian history and current life.

A number of senior scholars in this field are already relatively well-known to interdisciplinary scholars. Gerard Behague's work on Heitor Villa Lobos and on Latin American music more generally set a standard for musicology of the Americas.² Gerhard Kubik's wide-ranging ethnomusicological work has influenced the way two generations of scholars think about African influence in the Americas.³ Anthony Seeger's work on Amazonian indigenous music is a touchstone for anthropologists of the region, and his thought on musical traditions has shaped a broader array of inquiries.⁴ Elizabeth Travassos, Larry Crook, John Murphy and Suzel Reily have all become crucial interlocutors for scholars of the Brazilian northeast and southeast.⁵

Martha Tupinambá de Ulhôa's pathbreaking work on Brazilian rock, popular reception and categorization has strongly influenced work by literary scholars on similar scenes.⁶ Frederick Moehn's recent work on the production of MPB and its political resonance in the 1990s has similarly been met with great enthusiasm from a broader cultural studies audience.⁷ Carlos Sandroni's work on samba has been crucial to a broader reconsideration of the history of that form.⁸ Samuel Araújo's work has led the way for investigations of the intersections of popular music and politics.⁹ Thomas Garcia's and Tamara Livingston-Isenhour's work on choro has helped awaken interdisciplinary interest in this genre.¹⁰ And Cristina Magaldi's work on erudite music in nineteenth-century Rio de Janeiro has added sharp detail to our understanding of the ebb and flow of cultural influence in this period.¹¹

But the work of many younger scholars has yet to cross the disciplinary divide. There is a strong contingent of young ethnomusicologists of Brazil whose work will be of great interest to historians, anthropologists, political scientists and literary scholars. In addition to Gidal and Lamen, cited above, Andrew Connell on choro and its experimental off shoots, Dan Sharp on samba de coco and Pernambucan rural music, Jeff Packman on music and labor in Salvador da Bahia, and Ron Conner on maracatu in Ceará have all pursued work that is deeply-grounded in the concerns of social history.¹² Michael Silvers's research into forró and drought in Ceará, Michael Iyanaga's research on samba-de-roda and the politics of cultural patrimony, and Laila Rosa's research on Afro-Brazilian sacred music in Olinda are all projects that will reach fruition in the next several years, and should...