1963 - 1964 in a scrap-book

I don't know who invented scrap-books. I have always had scrap-books where I pasted clippings from magazines and newspapers until the Internet came along. My scrap-books were usually dedicated to my favourite pop stars and their latest hits. I had a friend called Claudete Deleva who was a little different. She loved pop music and the films but she liked all kinds of news too be it political or straight from the scandal sheets like 'Ultima Hora' and 'Notícias Populares' two very popular São Paulo newspapers. 

When I met Claudete in 1966, she had this seamstears's book filled with clippings of all kinds. I thought it 'funny'. I eve laughed at the things she considered 'important' enough to be included in the scrap-book. Now, looking back at it I see it is priceless because it captured a slice of time in the popular culture of late 1963, 1964 and early 1965.  

Claudete obviously had her preference in music & cinema. She loved Italian rocker Rita Pavone and was partial to Sarita Montiel in the movies. Apparently, Claudete starts her scrap-book around the time John Kennedy was murdered in Dallas, Texas.

Actress Maria Vidal drank poison and died later in hospital 14 May 1963; Mexican singer Miguel Aceves Mejia would visit Brazil soon; Janio Quadros had resigned as President in 1961, but was still the butt of jokes; President João Goulart would soon be toppled by a military coup that would drag the country back 100 years; Laura wanted to become Lauro; beautiful singer Gilda Lopes was depressed because her 9 year-old son had lost an arm in a bus accident;  British 'Profumo affair' was still raging; Audrey Hepburn and Shirley McLaine played a lesbian love-affair in a William Wyler movie called 'Infâmia' based on Lillian Hellman's 'The children's hour'; Chubby Checker and the twist were still popular; Miss Brazil was Black for the 1st time ever; monokini was in, bikini was out; controversial writer Adelaide Carraro of 'Eu e o governador' fame wanted to became a painter; Cassandra Rios who wrote mainly about lesbian love was accused of kidnapping; Henrique Lobo, a famous DJ changed radio stations, radio was still important enough to be news; the Beatles had arrived; Trini Lopez was a new release; Rita Pavone had a Brazilian romance; Brigitte Bardot visited Rio with Bob Zagury, her Brazilian beau; Edith Piaf married a Greek man young enough to be her son

John Kennedy is murdered in Dallas, the City of Hate

Mexican singer Miguel Aceves Mejia - tragic actress Maria Vidal 

President Jânio Quadros (1961) - President João Goulart (1961-1964)

Pelé wearing CBD's jersey

Laura wants to become Lauro

popular singer Gilda Lopes' s depression due to her son's tragic accident

The Profumo case - Lillian Hellmann's 'The children's hour'

Chubby Checker - Hebe Camargo - dona Leonor Mendes de Barros 

Vera Lucia Couto, Miss Guanabara 1964 

controversial writers Adelaide Carraro & Cassandra Rios 

Brigitte Bardot in Cabo Frio-RJ

domestic violence - DJ Henrique Lobo leaves Radio Excelsior

The Beatles have arrived - Trini Lopez's album is released 

Brigitte Bardot and her Brazilian beau Bob Zagury 

Rita Pavone and her Brazilian beau Netinho - Edith Piaf and her Greek beau Theo Sarapo

Agnaldo Rayol denies he's a drug fiend - Paul Anka monkeys around 

'A moça que veio de longe' is the most popular soap-opera ever - 'O direito de nascer' is revived

Doctor Kildare breaks a million hearts - Rinaldo Calheiros keeps on trucking 

Wilson Miranda smiles to his fans - Ronnie Cord's cute

Rita Pavone rocks the nation - Roberto Carlos waits in the wings for his turn 

Carlos Zara is top heart-throb - Lolita Rodrigues acts in soaps

Singer Agnaldo Rayol said he was not a drug addict; 'A moça que veio de longe' (The girl that came from afar) was the most popular TV soap-opera ever, starting a trend that has lasted 30 years up to date (2014); 'O direito de nascer' the most popular radio soap-opera ever was re-enacted on TV with similar success; Richard Chamberlain's 'Dr. Kildare' was top TV Excelsior; Rinaldo Calheiros sans Silvana still managed to appear on the cover of TV guide even without a hit-record; the same might be said of Wilson Miranda; Ronnie Cord was #1 with 'Rua Augusta', the 1st real Brazilian rock; Rita Pavone was the Italian Volcano; Roberto Carlos was young and new; actors Carlos Zara and Lolita Rodrigues were popular among soap-opera viewers; Sarita Montiel had known better days but she still had a faithful fan-club (Claudete being one of them); middle-aged comedian Dercy Gonçalves (she was 58 in 1964) was really hot on TV Excelsior with her weekly show.

Pelé talks about his plans to marry; Trini Lopez's 'Michael' is #1 in the singles' charts; Ray Conniff leads the extended-play charts and Trini Lopez's 'The Latin Album' is #1 in the LP's chart in the 1st week of 1965.

Politics of intolerance 2014 / Election of Candidate of Hate 2018

There is an increasing wave of intolerance in the midst of the Brazilian middle classes since President Lula came to power in 2002 and implemented a policy of redressing the old evils perpetrated by the old Oligachy against the working class. The introduction of a policy of transference of income to the lower classes - the so-called 'bolsa familia' has angered a sector of the middle class which has been fustigated by most of the media (TV, radio, newspapers and magazines) into believing that that lower classes do nothing but live off the dole. It is the same kind of strategy applied in the USA since the Reagan years and their 'welfare queens'.

This sort of chauvinism has created a 'politics of hate' very ugly and unjust. It is really disgusting to hear what most of the middle class has to say about the poorer part of the Brazilian population. The politics of segregation introduced by the Military Dictatorship that ruled Brazil from 1964 through to 1985 has not stopped yet. The Dictatorship has gone but its policies are all intact with most of the media doing their dirty work.

There's a lot to say about that. This page is intended to show how that 'politics of intolerance' is developing. We'll only post photos and art about the subject. The art above was published at weekly magazine Carta Capital. Unfortunately, I don't know who draw the picture. It shows a young male from the middle class in front of this computer wearing a Brazilian flag with 'Hate' written all over it. They hate Lula, 'baianos' (people from the Northeastern states that have migrated to the South in search of employment - after the Dictatorship stopped any kind of land-reform in 1964), putas (whores) and the usual suspects.

to read more about this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transfer_payment

Caetano Veloso & Gilberto Gil on 17 July 1969, at Rio Airport on their way to exile in London.

Caetano Veloso writes an opinion piece for The New York Times on the eve of Brazilian Presidential Election of 2018 in which right-wing hate-monger Jair Bolsonaro was poised to win... 

Opinion

Caetano Veloso: Dark Times Are Coming for My Country

In the late 1960s, the military dictatorship in Brazil arrested and imprisoned many artists and intellectuals for their political beliefs. I was one of them. The militarists are back.

By Caetano Veloso

Mr. Veloso is a composer, singer, writer and political activist.

24 October 2018

The far-right presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro in São Paulo, Brazil. He is expected to win a runoff on Sunday.CreditCreditNelson Almeida/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

RIO DE JANEIRO — “Brazil is not for beginners,” Antonio Carlos Jobim used to say. Mr. Jobim, who wrote “The Girl From Ipanema,” was one of Brazil’s most important musicians, one whom we can thank for the fact that music lovers everywhere have to think twice before pigeonholing Brazilian pop as “world music.

”

When I told an American friend about the maestro’s line, he retorted, “No country is.” My American friend had a point. In some ways, perhaps Brazil isn’t so special.

Right now, my country is proving it’s a nation among others. Like other countries around the world, Brazil is facing a threat from the far right, a storm of populist conservatism. Our new political phenomenon, Jair Bolsonaro, who is expected to win the presidential election on Sunday, is a former army captain who admires Donald Trump but seems more like Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippines’ strongman. Mr. Bolsonaro champions the unrestricted sale of firearms, proposes a presumption of self-defense if a policeman kills a “suspect” and declares that a dead son is preferable to a gay one.

If Mr. Bolsonaro wins the election, Brazilians can expect a wave of fear and hatred. Indeed, we’ve already seen blood. On Oct. 7, a Bolsonaro supporter stabbed my friend Moa do Katendê, a musician and capoeira master, over a political disagreement in the state of Bahia. His death left the city of Salvador in mourning and indignation.

Recently, I’ve found myself thinking about the 1980s. I was making records and playing to sold-out crowds, but I knew what needed to change in my country. Back then, we Brazilians were fighting for free elections after some 20 years of military dictatorship. If someone had told me then that some day we would elect to the presidency people like Fernando Henrique Cardoso and then Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, it would have sounded like wishful thinking. Then it happened. Mr. Cardoso’s election in 1994 and then Mr. da Silva’s in 2002 carried huge symbolic weight. They showed that we were a democracy, and they changed the shape of our society by helping millions escape poverty. Brazilian society gained more self-respect.

But despite all the progress and the country’s apparent maturity, Brazil, the fourth-largest democracy in the world, is far from solid. Dark forces, from within and from without, now seem to be forcing us backward and down.

Political life here has been in decline for a while — starting with an economic slump, then a series of protests in 2013, the impeachment of president Dilma Rousseff in 2016 and a huge corruption scandal that put many politicians, including Mr. da Silva, in jail. Mr. Cardoso’s and Mr. da Silva’s parties were seriously wounded, and the far right found an opportunity.

Many artists, musicians, filmmakers and thinkers saw themselves in an environment where reactionary ideologues, who — through books, websites and news articles — have been denigrating any attempt to overcome inequality by linking socially progressive policies to a Venezuelan-type of nightmare, generating fear that minorities’ rights will erode religious and moral principles, or simply by indoctrinating people in brutality through the systematic use of derogatory language. The rise of Mr. Bolsonaro as a mythical figure fulfills the expectations created by that kind of intellectual attack. It’s not an exchange of arguments: Those who don’t believe in democracy work in insidious ways.

The major news outlets have tended to minimize the dangers, working in fact for Mr. Bolsonaro by describing the situation as a confrontation between two extremes: the Workers’ Party potentially leading us to a Communist authoritarian regime, while Mr. Bolsonaro would fight corruption and make the economy market friendly. Many in the mainstream press willfully ignore the fact that Mr. da Silva respected the democratic rules and that Mr. Bolsonaro has repeatedly defended the military dictatorship of the 1960s and ’70s. In fact, in August 2016, while casting his vote to impeach Ms. Rousseff, Mr. Bolsonaro made a public show of dedicating his action to Carlos Alberto Brilhante Ustra, who ran a torture center in the 1970s.

As a public figure in Brazil, I have a duty to try to clarify these facts. I am an old man now, but I was young in the ’60s and ’70s, and I remember. So I have to speak out.

In the late ’60s, the military junta imprisoned and arrested many artists and intellectuals for their political beliefs. I was one of them, along with my friend and colleague Gilberto Gil.

Gilberto and I spent a week each in a dirty cell. Then, with no explanation, we were transferred to another military prison for two months. After that, four months of house arrest until, finally, exile, where we stayed for two and a half years. Other students, writers and journalists were imprisoned in the cells where we were, but none was tortured. During the night, though, we could hear people’s screams. They were either political prisoners who the military thought were linked to armed resistance groups or poor youngsters who were caught in thefts or drug selling. Those sounds have never left my mind.

Some say that Mr. Bolsonaro’s most brutal statements are just posturing. Indeed, he sounds very much like many ordinary Brazilians; he is openly demonstrating the superficial brutality many men think they have to hide. The number of women who vote for him is, in every poll, far smaller than the number of men. To govern Brazil, he will have to face the Congress, the Supreme Court and the fact that polls show that a greater majority than ever of Brazilians say democracy is the best political system of all.

I quoted Mr. Jobim’s line — “Brazil is not for beginners” — to bring a touch of funny color to my view of our hard times. The great composer was being ironic, but he spoke to a truth and underlined the peculiarities of our country, a gigantic country in the Southern Hemisphere, racially mixed, the only country with Portuguese as its official language in the Americas. I love Brazil and believe it can bring new colors to civilization; I believe most Brazilians love it, too.

Many people here say they are planning to live abroad if the captain wins. I never wanted to live in any country other than Brazil. And I don’t want to now. I was forced into exile once. It won’t happen again. I want my music, my presence, to be a permanent resistance to whatever anti-democratic feature may come out of a probable Bolsonaro government.

Caetano Veloso is a Brazilian composer, singer, writer and political activist.

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1947

September 1947 - Life magazine photographer Dmitri Kessel takes a shot at a building site wall with inscription against the out-lawing of the Brazilian Communist Party: Viva a Democracia! Plinio (Salgado), (General) Dutra & (Harry) Truman : Trio Fascista! Sem P.C.B. (Partido Comunista do Brasil) não há democracia. Viva (Luiz Carlos) Prestes! P.C.B. - (General) Dutra, já é hora! Fóra!

Luiz Carlos Prestes writes about Land Reform and the 1946 Constitution which was too conservative.

Luiz Carlos Prestes (centre) and Gregorio Bezerra (right-hand side).

The Hammer & Sickle symbol was banned from Brazilian life just like the Cross had been banned by the Romans in olden days. 

The 100,000 march - 1968

Rio de Janeiro, 26 June 1968 

Edu Lobo, an unidentified woman and Chico Buarque de Hollanda.

a rare colour photo by David Drew Zingg.

Nana Caymmi & Gilberto Gil wave to the camera...

Torquato Neto, Gilberto Gil, Nana Caymmi.  

Chico Buarque with sunglasses & Gilberto Gil.

Vladimir Pereira talks to the mass.

Brazilian artists in exile

Geraldo Vandré left Brazil fearing for his life in December 1968. He recorded his EP in France.

The 100,000 march in Rio de Janeiro on 26 July 1968. Instead of hearing the sound of the streets the Dictatorship turned even harder. One can see Caetano Veloso, Nana Caymmi, Gilberto Gil, Paulo Autran & Tonia Carrero among many.

Edu Lobo & Chico Buarque holding a  banner 'Against Repression' and a fag in his fingers. 

both Gilberto Gil & Caetano Veloso exiled in London in 1969.

Chico Buarque left Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for Rome in Italy - Manchete 4 April 1970.

Chico Buarque arrives in Brazil from exile in Rome, Italy on 20 March 1970.