Brazilian popular music has had a crucial role in the life of the country; one cannot begin to discuss Brazilian history without mentioning the profound effect of this repertoire upon it. Just as one cannot talk about Britain in the last decades without mentioning The Beatles, the Rolling Stones or David Bowie, so to understand Brazil we should hear and discuss the instrumental works of Pixinguinha, the incredible sambas of Caymmi, Ary Barroso, Cartola and Nelson Cavaquinho, irresistible dance movements like frevo and baião, moving on to the cool sophistications of Tom Jobim’s bossa nova, followed by the next generation of such poets and composers as Chico Buarque and Edu Lobo, and on to the strident clashes of Caetano Veloso’s tropicalismo, the unique black accent of Milton Nascimento’s music, all the way to the ingenious, solar constructions of Hermeto Paschoal and Egberto Gismonti, and the cosmopolitan São Paulo avant-garde.

Brazilian culture owes a great deal of its modern identity to the powers of invention of these masters of music and poetry, whose works you will hear tonight, in special arrangements for the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra (Osesp) with guest players from the city’s Jazz Symphony Orchestra, all under the direction of Osesp’s music director Marin Alsop.

We begin with Estrepolia Elétrica (Electric Havoc, 1976), by Moraes Moreira, one of the key figures of carnival in Bahia. It opens as a marcha-rancho, imitating the old processional groups of early 20th-century carnival, only to develop into a delirious frevo, a fast dance from the neighbouring state, Pernambuco.

Pixinguinha and Benedito Lacerda’s 1x0 (1949) is a late example of choro, an instrumental style prevalent in Rio one hundred years ago. Mixing European harmonies with African syncopated rhythms, blending virtuosity and an understated kind of melancholia, it pays homage to Friedenreich, Brazil’s first football star, who scored against Uruguay in the national team’s first title match, in 1919. (Cheers for the soprano sax soloist, Paula Valente.)

The next number brings together two emblems of a great tradition of Northeastern accordion players: Dominguinhos (in partnership with Gilberto Gil — composer and poet extraordinaire, years later a Minister of Culture), and Sivuca (with his wife Gloria Gadelha). First a lament from the sertão, a Northeastern wasteland, Lamento Sertanejo (1967); then a street party, Feira de Mangaio (1979), a baião, or, more specifically for this festive kind, a forró (a word adapted from the English “for all”).

It was Gilberto Gil who once called Dorival Caymmi a “Nago Buda”, alluding to the Afro-Brazilian religion of this quintessential man from Bahia, as well as to his wise, original, and seemingly timeless art of song. História de Pescadores (Fishermen’s Tale, 1965) is a suite, depicting life in a community of fishermen, by turns tragic and awesome. From these we will hear the two final parts: death of a fisherman, and the morning’s parting rafts, in a symphonic arrangement by the composer’s own son, Dori Caymmi.

There are many kinds of samba in Brazil. Nelson Cavaquinho and Cartola both belong to the less extrovert style, a powerful, often grieving underside to the happy sambas better known abroad. Folhas Secas (Dried Leaves, 1975) is a song of mourning for one’s own lost youth, and it makes poignant use of descending chromatic lines; O Sol Nascerá (The Sun Will Rise, 1961) moves in the opposite direction, with upward lines celebrating joyful maturity.

The advent of bossa nova in the late 1950s, signalled a new time for Brazil, embodying many of the ideals which the country has never completely fulfilled. For a short period of time they did find concrete realizations in music, as in architecture, or football, not to speak of democratic politics and public education. Tom Jobim’s Garota de Ipanema (Girl from Ipanema, 1961, with lyrics by Vinicius de Moraes) is the very emblem of this style, light and deep at the same time. The lyrics speak of an older man’s impossible desire for a passing girl, and the song alternates, almost like a film, between a vision of the girl (first and last parts) and the poet’s intimations of mortality (the central section).

Following on Jobim’s footsteps, but already under the very different circumstance of a military dictatorship (1964-1985), there came a whole generation of brilliant songwriters, foremost among them Chico Buarque and Edu Lobo. The two are partners in Beatriz (1983), written for a ballet inspired by Jorge de Lima’s surreal poem O Grande Circo Místico. The lyrics focus on the enigmatic life of an actress, and the melody describes an immense arc, from the lowest note (on the word “chão”, ground) to the highest (“céu”, sky). In this beautiful arrangement by Nelson Ayres, it is the viola who sings (played by Osesp’s principal Horácio Schaefer).

Honouring and confronting bossa nova at the same time, Caetano Veloso’s tropicalismo erupted on the scene to change things forever in Brazilian music. Industrial sounds, commercial slogans, and electric guitars were placed side by side with archaic strands of the Northeastern culture and advanced international styles. The role of the artist as performer and activist was made evident in the hard political context. Shortly after writing the iconic song Tropicália (1968) — a nightmarish vision of the new capital, Brasília —, Veloso was forced into exile. He and Gilberto Gil came to live in London, where they stayed for a year.

After bossa nova and tropicalismo, anything could happen. And it did happen. For instance, Milton Nascimento, who came from baroque countryside Minas Gerais to offer unexpected, highly original, Afro-Brazilian tones to a new popular music close to rock and jazz. An extraordinary singer himself, turned global star with a list of partners including Wayne Shorter, Paul Simon, Herbie Hancock and James Taylor, he is one of the central names of the 1970s and 1980s, with epic songs like Milagre dos Peixes (Miracle of the Fish, 1973).

The 1970s also saw the emergence of virtuoso instrumentalists such as Hermeto Paschoal and Egberto Gismonti. Encyclopedic musicians, informed by classical avant-garde as much as by folk and popular music, both helped develop what by now has become a whole lineage of advanced instrumental music in Brazil. This arrangement of Hermeto Paschoal’s Bebê and Gismonti’s Frevo was written by André Mehmari, himself one of the leading names of the new generation in São Paulo.

One could not finish this short anthology of Brazilian music without the most iconic song of all, Ary Barroso’s Aquarela do Brasil (Brazilian Watercolor, 1939). It was written during the Vargas regime, and it was extensively used later to promote patriotism. Regardless of this use, the song does seem to touch a very deep nerve of Brazil, in its very mixture of brash pride and a sensual, sad kind of joy, or joyful sadness, where the many contradictory poles of Brazilian culture may find resolution.

There is a long way to go for the country to come to terms with its own history, and its own potential, but here, in the music, it has already given infinite proof of what can be achieved. It remains a source of inspiration for all of us who believe in an inclusive society, and it gives us all the chance to enjoy, at least for a while, a life lived freely under the sun.

ARTHUR NESTROVSKI (B.A. York, PhD. Iowa) is the Artistic Director of the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra.