Parade of samba schools Rio Carnival 1920s

The 1920s
In the 1920s, the ranches were the biggest attraction of the carnival street parade on Avenida Rio Branco, and its components came from the middle class.  Even already the poorest people, who do not parade in ranches due to the high cost of costumes, came out in blocks and strips.  They were formed mainly by blacks from Bahia, who lived in the area of Health, and the parade is presented mainly in and around Square Eleven, with the sound of batucada, a rhythm of African origin, and elements of Candomble.

At that time there were the “blocks of dirty,” which came out during the day.  The name originates from the fact that the members would go to the block without taking a bath.   The participants used improvised costumes, made of linen and masks that looked like skulls (called Clovis).  Opening the parade were a group of elderly with face masks; named strings of old, they would be the embryos of committees in front of future schools of samba.

Many men were dressed as women, and vice versa.  This carnival tradition of the reversal of sex roles would lead years later to the block of piranhas, where men came dressed as women.  It is still common in today’s carnival in the suburbs Rio.

The associations were beginning to organize. In Estacio neighborhood, near the center of Rio de Janeiro, considered the birthplace of the samba schools, is The Union Makes the Force, whose red and white was a reference to the American Football Club.  Popular culture was always a part of Union figures, such as: Bide, Ismael Silva Bastos and Newton. The block lasted until 1927, when their leader, the legendary Mano Rubem, died.

The batucada was accompanied by percussion instruments from Africa and used many of their religious rites, such as Candomble.  Instruments improvised from household items like plates, knives and frying pans were common until the batteries currently used in schools of samba.  They also used items such as cavaquinho strings and guitars, as well as other tambourines and rattles.

In 1928, replacing The Union Makes the Force, is the Let Talk, whose meetings took place in front of the Normal School in Largo Estacio, then baptized as Escola de Samba. Today they meet in the street Mariz e Barros, in Tijuca.  Let Talk is considered the first school of samba, but there are doubts as to whether it really was a school or a block carnavalesco.

The samba, which at the time was very popular rhythm music, was popular for dance and the carnival itself, especially since 1917, when the National Library Donga samba recorded On the Phone.  The first recorded samba in history, On the Phone had extraordinary success in the Carnival of 1918, and was sung by several blocks, strings and even by large companies.

Samba at that time was similar to the gherkin, which was another very popular rhythm. Let’s Talk Group created a new form of samba by inventing a new instrument of percussion, the deaf-dial.  Bide created it using a 20 kg can of butter, opening the two sides, and covering it with a piece of cement paper bag.  Slightly moistened and heated, it was then wrapped with a thick wire. It appeared the deaf-dial would be the main instrument for the battery. (The carnival and Licia Lacerda Rosa Magalhaes submitted this article in 1982, which was the memorable parade of Paticumbum Prugurundum Imperio Serrano).

Bide also modified the structure of samba, changing its impromptu character. While only the chorus was previously fixed, since then the second part of the samba was composed.

At the end of the 1920s the popular carnival had expanded to other areas of the city, such as the Mangueira slum and its environs.  Here its blocks and cords showed artists like Cartola and Carlos Cachaca, among others, with associations from the Shrovetide, such as Warriors of the mountain and the Game Mangueira. Fights among rivals became common among its components.

Cartola, in 1925, created the block of Arengueiros, bringing together young people from the rioting morrro that, due to ill conduct, were prevented from leaving the blocks “of family.” In 1929 the Cartola Arengueiros Block was dissolved to create the First Season, formed by the union of Arengueiros with several blocks and local strings. Always known simply as Hat, his first parade was in 1930. He was responsible for selecting the colors green and pink for the flag of the school and the singer was Silvio Caldas, a friend of Cartola’s.  In honor of Hat, the figure of the deaf is the symbol of the college, the school and the battery being unmistakable as the only one playing the deaf marking unanswered, an inherited characteristic of that era.

In other parts of the city associations are organized, such as Will and the suburb of Oswaldo Cruz, founded in 1923 by Snowbunny Paulo da Portela.  In the 1930s it would be named Portela, for the name of the road where its headquarters is located. In 1931 in Tijuca, north of the city, in United Tijuca was organized, and in 1933, in the port of Gamboa, Faladeira the Neighbor, who would be responsible for the introduction of the luxury fashion in the schools of samba. Since most blacks were Sambistas and popular socially, most of the schools of samba of the hills were organized in Rio, where the general population lived.