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The sounds of BATALA |
| Samba-Reggae
is an offspring of the Tropicalismo movement of the 60’s &
70’s which combined samba with rock, funk, jazz and later reggae. It was
reggae’s message of black pride and hope in the face of life's
adversities as much as its offbeat groove that struck a chord with the
mainly black population. The man who was responsible for its
creation was Neguinho de Samba, then musical director of Ile Aiye, the
seminal afro-bloco, who in 1974 became the first black group to play in
the Salvador Carnival. Neguino took the militant Nago sounds of Ile Aiye
that he had created and mixed them with the offbeat rhythms of the reggae
records that were starting to be heard in Salvador in the late 70’s. In
the mid eighties he founded Olodum where he brought the whole concept to
fruition and to worldwide attention and created the mould that would be
the template for samba-reggae and Salvador Carnival. After leaving Olodum he set up an all female afro-bloco called "Banda Dida Femina" which he still runs successfully helping to empower women. Later he set up an associated musical school for local children which he supports with the money from his royalties. |
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music of Batala originates in Salvador de Bahia in North Eastern Brazil.
Batala was formed as the European wing of Cortego Afro, (a style of
Brazilian Samba) by Giba Goncalves in Paris in 1997.
Giba is the maestro of the Batala sound, which he composed after the style of his home town Salvador, in Brazil. The music has its roots in African traditional music which found its way to Brazil and has been incorporated in to Brazilian culture since. The name ‘batala’ is a derivation of the French for "hit there", a modern pun. It is also connected to the supreme God of the Yoruba culture Obatala, along with Olodumare is one of the names of the supreme God in that culture. During the slave trade of the 1800s, the bata drum crossed the Atlantic and gradually became a popular playing instrument in America, Cuba and beyond.
More details to come as site develops |