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Nara Leão gives voice to the history of her time

Research investigates the discography of the Espírito Santo singer during the military dictatorship

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Singer Nara Leão performed in different repertoires and styles musicals in the 1960s, always with an evident political bias, contrasting with the moment led by the military dictatorship. “He was a figure open to public debate and attentive to cultural movements. With this, he synthesized in his trajectory the discussions that were at stake during the period and the contradictions of part of his generation – which were expressed in themes such as tradition and engagement, on the one hand, and modernity and the market, on the other”, stated the musician Ismael de Oliveira Gerolamo in his doctoral research, defended at the Institute of Arts (IA).

The study showed that these different facets of the singer were expressed in the production and mainly in her vocal gesture. According to Ismael, Nara was central to understanding this period: she anticipated and guided some paths for popular song. Interestingly, she almost fell into oblivion.

The singer, “trained” musically in bossa nova, brought a modern heritage, an aura of sophistication, typical of the musical style of the south zone of Rio de Janeiro. At the same time, she staged a return to samba de morro. “These and other ambiguities were expressed exemplarily by the singer”, says the researcher.

But Nara's gateway to music was bossa nova. She was then around 15 years old and lived in a famous place for this musical genre: Avenida Atlântica, in Rio de Janeiro. Much is said about the importance of her parents' apartment in the emergence of bossa nova, as if she had been born there. The fact is that the place was a meeting point for musicians.

Photo: Reproduction
Nara Leão between Zé Keti (left) and João do Vale in “Opinião”: singer fought the dictatorship and opened the way for popular music

While her performance revealed a sense of interference in the public sphere, she and other songwriters were selling many records and operating in the market. Nara felt and expressed this ambiguity, so much so that she moved away from the protest song because she thought it was becoming pure consumption. However, she continued with political activity.

His musical performance was one in the context of the song engaged. He seemed to want to impact the listener to give more body and power to his voice. When he abandoned this repertoire, he moved closer to more lyrical productions and Tropicália, endorsing the movement of Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Tom Zé and Torquato Neto. Presented another vocal gesture, this time softer, like a return to certain bossa nova vocal parameters.


Choices

In his thesis, supervised by IA professor José Roberto Zan, Ismael brought together Nara's musical productions, focusing on his discography. He investigated his trajectory in the 1960s and his willingness to interfere socially. “My study sheds light on the singer’s musical and performance aspects, relating her work to the historical context of those years,” he revealed.

The researcher wanted to understand the meaning of Nara's choices, since bossa nova. It was also one of the main expressions of the protest song, with its engaged albums and the show Opinion, a musical show by Augusto Boal produced by Teatro de Arena and members of National Union of Students  (UNE), an institution considered illegal by the military regime.

At a certain point, Nara moved away from the committed song and migrated to a more lyrical production by Chico Buarque and Sidney Muller, which also had a strong political streak, but which differed from protest and festival songs.


New directions

“Nara played a secondary role in bossa nova. He gave small presentations in clubs, at universities, in an almost amateur context”, reported the researcher. At the time, she was dating Ronaldo Bôscoli, who produced bossa nova shows. It turns out that he and some colleagues didn't give him much attention on those occasions.

From 1962 onwards, it took a new direction. She was invited to record at Elenco Records, owned by Aloysio de Oliveira, a popular music producer and composer. When her album came out in 1964, she had little to do with bossa nova. Nara was already making a move with Carlos Lyra to resume sambas by popular composers such as Zé Keti, Nelson Cavaquinho and Cartola, linked to samba schools. At that time, the singer recorded a repertoire with sambas de morro and also songs by Edu Lobo and Carlos Lyra, which already had a strong political bias.

In the 1960s, Nara released practically two albums a year. The disk Opinion inspired the show that bore the same name. Oduvaldo Vianna Filho transformed the album into a musical piece. He highlighted a figure from the upper middle class, who was Nara Leão; a composer representing the hill, who was Zé Keti; and a migrant from the Northeast, who was João do Vale. The show was a hit among university youth.

Between 1968 and 1970, the singer released just two albums. In the following decade, it had a sparse production, but without ceasing to produce. Afterwards, she spent some longer periods without recording.


Ruptures

By separating himself from bossa nova, Nara gave another meaning to his trajectory and became one of the main leaders of musical engagement, protest songs, from 1964 to 1966. He leaned towards cultural and artistic debates. He criticized the singing of love, smiles, flowers in the face of the political situation, which was tense. Bossa nova was lighter, the result of everyday life in the south.

In 1964, the singer gave an interview to a celebrity magazine saying: “bossa nova makes me sleepy”. Fans of the genre were insulted. And Nara continued to be involved in numerous cultural and political controversies, given his aptitude for public debate. “But she enjoyed a relatively comfortable position. Her father was a lawyer and came from a privileged social class, which allowed her to maintain a certain distance from the artistic world, a critical distance in relation to show business,” said Ismael.

Photo: Scarpa
Musician Ismael de Oliveira Gerolamo, author of the research

An expression of ambiguities of great importance for understanding the period, the singer was involved in debates and wanted to interfere in the public sphere, however she was reticent in relation to the music market. When she started to get noticed, she would move away, abandon projects, take vacations. She talked about quitting her career.

In 1966, he declared that the military government was horrible and that the army was worthless. The newspaper Diário de Notícias published the interview, whose title was Nara is of the opinion: this army is worthless, making a pun on the show Opinion. This, however, did not intimidate her. She maintained that the military government should give up power.

Nara was threatened with prosecution. This caused a commotion in the artistic world, as she was very loved. Artists held demonstrations and signed petitions in support.

Carlos Drummond de Andrade came to her defense in a poem published in the same news, telling her not to arrest her. When interrogating Chico Buarque, a few years later, the military always asked about Nara. At the time, she was married to filmmaker Cacá Diegues, and the couple decided to go into self-exile in Paris for three years.

In 1966, at the Record MPB Festival, she performed The band, by Chico Buarque. It was her peak as a singer, in terms of success with the public. For her, it was suffering, as she could not tolerate success or tours. He almost dropped everything. However, she always ended up returning, for financial reasons [she was very well paid] or for the possibility of participating in the debates of the period.

“Nara never stopped producing records. He enjoyed choosing repertoire, researching new composers and old compositions, calling musicians to play. He recorded popular songs and old marchinhas, as well as sambas from other carnivals and even imperial modinha”, described Ismael. More recently, the singer was portrayed in the TV Globo special “For all my life” and, in addition to her theatrical appearances, she acted in some films, such as When the carnival arrives, by Cacá Diegues, alongside Chico Buarque and Maria Bethânia.

Nara Leão even enrolled in a Psychology course in the 1970s, which she never completed. He discovered an inoperable benign tumor. He passed away in 1989, at the age of 47, leaving Isabel and Francisco, children he had with Cacá Diegues.

 

Images: ReproductionEDITOR'S PLAYLIST


The Boat (Roberto Menescal)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6JPFy0OM1M

Opinion (Nara Leão, João do Vale and Zé Keti)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JBGm22i-Rk

Carcará (João do Vale)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4poHPINYuFQ

Say I went there (Zé Keti and Hortêncio Rocha)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lkDuC5S2aQ

The band (Chico Buarque)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITMQaaUA9S8

It's dark but I sing (Monsueto Menezes and Thiago de Mello)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibTz0mCv650

Brunette with water eyes (Chico Buarque)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vc4t7geoCCo

With sugar, with affection (Chico Buarque)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ITiDPGH9qE

The road and the guitarist (Sidney Miller)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC0QdX8i1IQ

Lindonéia (Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2dbCiH3nrc

Cuitelinho (Folklore/Version by Paulo Vanzolini)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCXfX6_oWJ0&list=RDzCXfX6_oWJ0&t=15

Penas do Tiê (Hekel Tavares/Nair Mesquita)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MM4ygcKUItY

João and Maria (Chico Buarque and Sivuca)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tQdqepsLOs&list=RD5tQdqepsLOs&t=2

Photography (Tom Jobim)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WY3p3WxBBZ4

Mambembe (Chico Buarque)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2jjXcymcPA

I was born to dance (João Donato)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-NsKZM6VRU

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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