UCLA UCLA Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Sounding Ceará: Music and the Environment in Northeastern Brazil Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/69m6m60q Author Silvers, Michael Benjamin Publication Date 2012 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Sounding Ceará: Music and the Environment in Northeastern Brazil A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Ethnomusicology by Michael Benjamin Silvers 2012 © Copyright by Michael Benjamin Silvers 2012 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Sounding Ceará: Music and the Environment in Northeastern Brazil by Michael Benjamin Silvers Doctor of Philosophy in Ethnomusicology University of California, Los Angeles, 2012 Professor Anthony Seeger, Chair This dissertation is an acoustic ethnography of the state of Ceará in Northeastern Brazil, with a focus on drought and the natural environment; drought is of particular symbolic and material importance to people in Ceará. One of the central narratives of life in Ceará involves migration and return. Here, I consider the discursive construction of Ceará as a natural, rural and traditional place through processes of migration and through a recording industry that saw migrants as both consumers and icons for a changing urban and national character. However, my emphasis is on the question of return. I investigate how urbanized and nationalized constructions of Ceará—often imagined as exclusively rural and unremittingly drought-ridden—impact ii contemporary Ceará and its musical culture. How are sounds, musics, practices, natures, geographies, and individuals shaped by mediated representations and caricatures of those very sounds, practices, geographies and identities? Drawing from acoustic ecology (Schafer 1994), acoustemology (Feld 1996), ecomusicology (e.g., Rehding 2002; Allen 2011), and discussions of musical sustainability (Titon 2009; Turino 2009), as well as from literature on rurality, capitalism, and nostalgia (e.g., Williams 1973; Stewart 1988; Dent 2009), I discuss traditional and hegemonic knowledge in urbanized rural and ruralized urban musical and agricultural practices, including the baião and forró music of Luiz Gonzaga; I interpret soundscapes in Fortaleza, the state capital, and Orós, a small city in the interior, to discuss the political and economic control of acoustic space, especially as it relates to musician Raimundo Fagner in Orós and electronic forró in Fortaleza; I analyze two contemporary musical projects—an opera and a rock band—that posit distinct relationships between Ceará's nature and literary, historical, social, and musical worlds; and I investigate movements for cultural preservation as they address the sustainability of both nature and culture. I conclude that nostalgic representations of the sertão demonstrate the complexity and malleability of contemporary northeastern music and culture, that environmental sounds and music in Ceará are heard in ways that have been maintained through oral tradition and mediated through audio recording, and that Ceará's soundscapes are constructed through community actions and legislation, by music industries, and through conflicting subjectivities. I also suggest that discourses of musical sustainability can be complexified by the example of forró, which was originally commercial popular music but has since become traditional music. iii The dissertation of Michael Benjamin Silvers is approved. Steven Loza Mitchell Morris Timothy D. Taylor Anthony Seeger, Committee Chair University of California, Los Angeles 2012 iv Whence comes the baião? It comes from beneath the clay of the earth . Whence comes hope, the sustenance that spreads the green from your eyes across the plantation? Oh, it comes from beneath the clay of the earth. -Gilberto Gil, “De Onde Vem o Baião” v TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of Figures viii Acknowledgements ix Vita xii 1 INTRODUCTION: THEORIZING NATURE, NOSTALGIA, AND FORRÓ IN CEARÁ 1 Scholarly Literature and Theoretical Perspectives About Sound, Music and Drought 5 Theorizing Forró 19 Organization 23 Justifying Ceará as the Location of Research 24 The Significance of Drought in Ceará 26 2 FROM NATURAL TO MEDIATED SOUNDSCAPES: BIRDSONG AND A SONG ABOUT A BIRD 38 Birdsong and Rain Prophecy 42 The Meeting of the Rain Prophets 44 Luiz Gonzaga's Mediated Sertão 51 Asa Branca: The Anthem of the Northeast 64 3 ACOUSTEMOLOGY: LISTENING TO RESERVOIRS, ROOFTOPS, AND RADIOS IN ORÓS 72 Landscapes and Soundscapes of Orós 76 Dantas: The Voice of Liberty 80 vi Raimundo Fagner and the Mediation of Orós 84 Fagner's Social Responsibility to Orós and the Sertão 89 The Reception of Fagner in Orós 92 Orós FM: The Sound of the Waters 96 Transnational Mediated Soundscapes Heard Locally 100 4 MODEL SOUNDSCAPES: MOACIR OF THE SEVEN DEATHS AND ELETROCACTUS 104 Moacir of the Seven Deaths 108 Eletrocactus 126 5 ACOUSTIC DESIGN: FORTALEZA'S TWO FORRÓS AND THE SUSTAINABILITY OF SOUND 144 Electronic Forró 147 Contesting Electronic Forró 156 Quieting Electronic Forró 170 6 CONCLUSION 176 Music and the Environment 176 Musical Sustainability 184 Glossary 189 Bibliography 192 vii TABLE OF FIGURES Figure 1. Map of Ceará and the Northeast in the context of Brazil and South America 4 Figure 2. Map of cities relevant to this dissertation 5 Figure 3. The semi-arid region of Ceará 29 Figure 4. Home with satellite dish in Orós 77 Figure 5. Orós reservoir and spillway 78 Figure 6. Radiadora in Orós 81 Figure 7. Radiadora in Orós (close) 81 Figure 8. Road map of Orós, indicating Dantas and Fagner 98 Figure 9. Dantas broadcasting to Fagner, side illustration 99 Figure 10. Forró bad, metal good t-shirt 158 Figure 11. 2nd Tomara Que Chova billboard, Quixadá 163 Figure 12. Sound system complaint hotline, Facebook post 173 viii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I am deeply grateful for the financial support without which this dissertation would have been impossible, including a Fulbright-mtvU grant from the U.S. Department of State and mtvU, and grants from the UCLA International Institute, the Herb Alpert School of Music Student Opportunity Fund, the UCLA Graduate Division, and the UCLA Department of Ethnomusicology. Tony Seeger is a tireless advisor, an inimitable scholar, and a role model, and his patience, guidance, encouragement, and insistence on depth and rigor have been immeasurable. Thank you, Tony, for your kindness and your insight. Thanks also to my committee: Mitchell Morris, Timothy Taylor, and Steven Loza, all of whom generously offered their time to discuss my ideas as I developed this research, and whose suggested readings guided my approach. I owe a special thanks to Danielle Maia Cruz, who co-authored an article with me in 2011, “Maracatunaíma: Musical Semiotics, The Northeastern Imaginary and the Sound of Fortaleza.” Vibrant (8)1: 228-259 (http://www.vibrant.org.br/downloads/v8n1_cruz_silvers.pdf). In the second half of chapter five of this dissertation, I include modified portions of our article, and Danielle deserves sole responsibility for the discussion of Ceará's Government of Changes and of maracatu cearense. Furthermore, the two of us generated many of the ideas in the latter portion of that chapter concerning ethnicity, the Semana de Arte Moderna, and the regional rock band Eletrocactus over cups of cafezinho and Skype conversations as we collaborated on the article. Anthropologist Lea Rodrigues served as my research advisor in Fortaleza while I was on ix my Fulbright-mtvU grant, and I am indebted to her for her tutelage, and, in particular, for her suggestion that I attend the Meeting of the Rain Prophets in Quixadá. She also helped me organize my sometimes-erratic thoughts and position Cearense music in the local social context. Ricardo Bezerra was my host father when I studied abroad in Fortaleza as an undergraduate student, and he has since become a close friend. He provided me with my initial access to the local music scene; our conversations about local culture, music, and tradition gave rise to many of the ideas I discuss in this dissertation. Also, thanks to Bete, Eugenia, and Dilma. Sâmia Maluf let me stay in her home, invited me to present my research, and challenged me with stimulating conversations about Brazilian academia. Toinha Santos looked after me and provided me with a crucial perspective. Chico Freitas's talent and creativity opened my eyes and his outsize generosity facilitated my research in Cariri. Simone Castro introduced me to several northeastern traditions, asked important questions about popular music, and invited me to be her dance partner in a quadrille performance that I will never forget. Márcio Mattos has graciously dialogued with me about forró and my research since 2007. Others in Ceará who showed me hospitality and helped guide my ideas include Izaíra Silvino, Emy Maia, Oswald Barroso, Tarcísio Lima, Adelson Vianna, the members of the Associação Cearense do Forró, the members of Eletrocactus, Elvis Matos, Nirez, Aluísio Lima, and Patrícia and João Soares. I am also grateful for the intelligence, talent, and friendship of Tarcísio Bezerra Martins Filho, Nathália Cardoso, Uirá dos Reis, Priscila Lima, Cátia Riehl, and Lorena Nunes. Catherine Appert, Kariann Goldschmitt, and Lisa Knisely read many drafts of chapters of this dissertation and related proposals, and their critiques and encouragement have been essential. Liz Macy proofread my bibliography. Thanks