Bossa Nova: The Story of the Brazilian Music That Seduced the World (40 page)

Maria was annoyed not just by this; he also did not appreciate being suddenly relegated to an obscure corner of the past. Hell, in 1960 he was just thirty-nine, which didn’t exactly make him a contemporary of Methuselah. And besides, he wasn’t able to discern the kind of musical talent in those kids that gave them the right to belittle the work of their elders, like João Pernambuco, Fernando Lobo, Haroldo Barbosa, Wilson Batista, Sílvio Caldas, Herivelto Martins, and well, why not he himself, Antônio Maria. And when had his very old friend Vinícius stopped wearing short pants? It must have been back at the end of World War I, since he had been born in 1912! Maria was hooked by the controversy and challenged the entire bossa nova crowd to a debate on his program
Preto no branco
(Black on White) on TV Rio.

Vinícius was abroad, in Montevideo, which freed him from getting involved in this awkward situation. But everyone else who could defend the bossa nova flag withdrew one by one: Jobim, João Gilberto, Menescal, even Bôscoli. The burden ended up falling on the shoulders of none other than André Midani. He went to the television station, and in a Portuguese whose every word appeared to be accented on the final syllable, he faced the enormous and not very well groomed Maria. Midani justified the new music in terms of a “new market” and spoke of how the bossa nova musicians were talented, exemplary youngsters with no vices, who were merely a little eccentric. Practically the only thing he didn’t say was that they all bathed daily and that Menescal’s favorite flavor of chewing gum was cinnamon.

Antônio Maria was not convinced, and continued with his jibes in his daily column in
O Jornal
. Ronaldo Bôscoli retaliated by inventing two terrible nicknames for him which began to circulate around the nightclubs. The first was “Galak,” after a brand of white chocolate that had just come out. The other was “Brown Eminence.” Both were references to the fact that Antônio Maria wasn’t exactly one of the world’s fairest people. The nicknames must have been construed by Maria as an affront to his white soul because, one night, he went to look for Ronaldo Bôscoli in Beco das Garrafas (Bottles Lane) to ask him to explain himself.

To face Maria with nothing more than his own bare hands meant that Bôscoli would have more than likely ended up in a funeral chapel. And that
was what was indeed fated to happen when the ample columnist brushed past Ronaldo in the doorway of the Little Club, threatening to push him around a little, and Bôscoli considered the implications of reacting. Just as the two of them were about to come to blows, Aloysio de Oliveira, who was amusing himself by watching the spectacle, decided to intervene: he unzipped his fly and urinated on Antônio Maria’s shoe. It was the last thing Maria was expecting. He looked down at his shoe as if he were wearing gaiters. It was like a scene from Laurel and Hardy. The three of them exploded into hysterics and went into the Little Club to have a drink. But Maria continued to dislike bossa nova, and Ronaldo went on calling him “Galak.”

The fuss made by the press over bossa nova had the downside of branding all music that came before it “old,” and it was natural for those who had written it to feel as if their toes were being stepped on. When asked his opinion, Sílvio Caldas tried to sound superior: “It’s a passing phase, initiated by kids who are the very model of the disobedience and ill manners of the current era. It will pass, because it lacks the value that only authenticity confers.”

But he must have been worried, because when Cyro Monteiro, another true representative of the old guard, declared his support for the young people, Sílvio, offended, branded him “a samba deviant.” He also made a point of announcing his retirement for the twelfth time.

In São Paulo, the conductor Gabriel Migliori, composer of the sound track to
O cangaceiro
(The Bandit), was noncommittal: “To me, bossa nova seems to be all about the third sex.”

The society women in Rio de Janeiro obviously didn’t agree with him, because they engaged in catfights among themselves in order to attract the attention of the movement’s leading men, like Jobim, Menescal, Bôscoli, Lyra, and Normando, who at the time were no longer attempting to disappoint André Midani as much in that department—at least Bôscoli wasn’t.

Jobim, who was the most coveted, but was kept on a tight leash by his wife, Teresa, only strayed on rare occasions, as happened with French starlet Mylène Démongeot. Not all the girls knew that he was married. When one of them draped herself over his piano, like a crocheted runner, he was unable to resist saying to the girl: “I wrote this chord for you …”

The girl’s bosom heaved, but when she languidly suggested, “Tommm, take me hoooome?,” he quickly came to his senses.

“Just a minute, let me go and phone Teresa …”

The most classic incident of this kind in the annals of bossa nova is attributed to Normando Santos, who was by then an instructor at the Lyra and Menescal’s guitar academy, and who had as one of his students the Second Lady of the country, Maria Teresa, wife of Vice-President João Goulart. According to him, she invited him on one occasion to see “a little film at the
Palácio at four o’clock.” All excited, Normando turned up at the Palácio cinema in Cinelândia at the appointed hour, bought two tickets and waited for her by the door. An hour later, he decided that his illustrous student had stood him up, and went home. The next day, he found out that she had evidently been waiting for him at the Palácio Laranjeiras (the Vice-President’s office/residence) and not at the Palácio cinema.

Bossa nova had adversaries in all walks of life, from the press to musicians, but even among the conductors, the offensive Gabriel Migliori was in a minority. The only important colleague of his to back him up was Oswaldo Borba, who lacked the courtesy to hide his aversion to bossa nova even in front of Aloysio de Oliveira, who hired him at Odeon. Everyone else—Léo Peracchi, Lyrio Panicalli, Radamés Gnattali, and, of course, Lindolfo Gaya and Moacyr Santos—openly supported or approved of the new music. The young conductors of São Paulo, like Rogério Duprat, Diogo Pacheco, and Julio Medaglia, were wholehearted fans, perhaps because, like Jobim and Severino Filho, of Os Cariocas, they had been students of the German composer, Hans Joachim Koellreutter, who was based in Rio. And another conductor, Guerra Peixe, Menescal’s former teacher, provided wholehearted endorsement when he expressed his opinion: “Bossa nova is like a harmonious insecticide against the harshness of
batuques
and the castrating quality of boleros.”

The unfortunate bolero was the greater villain, and bossa nova employed the strategy of pointing its weapons at the musical genre. By doing so, it made a point of saying that it was on the side of the purists, and thus neutralized the attacks that were being launched upon it, accusing it of being nothing more than a jazz rip-off. Ronaldo Bôscoli even went as far as to announce in public: “It’s ridiculous that the most popular singer in Brazil should sing boleros.”

The target was Anísio Silva, who caused tears to flow like waterfalls with sentimental songs like “Sonhando contigo” (Dreaming with You). At the time, words like
tacky
and
show-off
didn’t exist, and the most insulting thing you could call a singer was
Shanghai
—an expression coined by society columnist Ibrahim Sued meaning unrefined, tasteless. Anyone who had any taste had to agree with Bôscoli’s opinion of Anísio Silva, even if they privately didn’t feel, as he did, that João Gilberto should have been the most popular singer in Brazil. What Bôscoli wasn’t expecting, however, was to hear a surprising statement from João Gilberto himself, under his breath and almost embarrassed: “I like Anísio. He’s not like the others.”

What he meant to say was that Anísio Silva, although he undeniably sang boleros, did not have that same tiresome consistency that seemed to be the trademark of his genre. But João Gilberto went on. He was also a fan of Dalva
de Oliveira. “Dalvinha has perfect pitch,” he said. Bôscoli heard him and was appalled, and felt it best not to spread João Gilberto’s unorthodox opinions. They wouldn’t be good for bossa nova business. If anyone had told him in 1960 that less than ten years later João Gilberto would be recording downright Mexican boleros like “Farolito” (Little Lighthouse) and “Bésame mucho” (Kiss Me Often), he would have denied it with the utmost vehemence—but deep down, perhaps he wasn’t really so sure.

But however hard Bôscoli tried to deflect the bullets, the old guard had bossa nova in its sights, and the new genre had to be careful not to bring the entire artillery down on its head at once. After all, the recording companies—including Odeon—were in the hands of men whom he had labeled “moldy figs.”

“We’re not criticizing the old guard for being old, but for what they did wrong,” Bôscoli argued. “You’re the reason we’re here,” Menescal fawned. Tom Jobim cited the late Custódio Mesquita as one of his heroes, and explained: “Bossa isn’t new or old. Ary Barroso and Dorival Caymmi are fine examples of bossa from all the eras.” Except for the gentle Ataulpho Alves, who remained upset at being called “antiquated” by André Midani, the rest of them calmed down for a while.

The soft-soaping of Ary Barroso, however, was interminable. The old composer went on television several times to announce that Tom Jobim was “the greatest Brazilian composer in the last few decades.” It’s a fact, though, that in the Fiorentina restaurant, after many whiskeys, Ary’s opinion did seem to change. But everyone knew that, sitting at the table that was saved for him in the restaurant, Ary’s opinion didn’t count for much. Like on the many occasions he insisted on driving home, even though this meant almost certain death. One night, a friend of his had to confiscate his car keys and rage: “Hell, Ary, you’re in no fit state to even direct a Brazilian film!”

As for Caymmi, he was a natural ally of bossa nova because João Gilberto had revitalized his music, singing it in a modern style. He was also João and Bôscoli’s neighbor. Bôscoli would pick up Caymmi at home to take him to the television station. On one of those occasions, Caymmi awoke late and practically went from his bed directly into Bôscoli’s car. The latter asked him, “Aren’t you going to comb your hair?”

And Caymmi replied, “No, I combed it before I left Bahia.”

“Doralice,” by Caymmi and Antonio Almeida, was one of the songs that João Gilberto was going to include on the record that he would start recording at the end of March. Os Anjos do Inferno had released the song in 1945 and it
was a huge hit at the time—at least, it was one of the most-requested records played over Mr. Emicles’s sound system in young João Gilberto’s Juazeiro. (He loved it, and played it until the town reached for the Alka-Seltzer.) But since then, “Doralice” had not been recorded very often and had almost been forgotten. Except for by João, who still remembered Léo Vilar’s arrangement well, especially the end with that
pa-rum-pa-pa
which the Anjos did, which he wanted to reproduce.

Another song that became a part of his discography was “I’m Looking over a Four-Leaf Clover,” by Mort Dixon and Harry Woods. It was an old hit from 1927, but had made its way back into the charts with Al Jolson in 1950. João heard it every day at the Murray, first sung by Jolson, then by Russ Morgan, and finally by Nilo Sérgio, his friend at the Murray, who made a Portuguese version and recorded it under the title “Trevo de quatro folhas” (Four-Leaf Clover). Nilo Sérgio would later become famous with another cover song, “Cavaleiros do céu” (Ghost Riders in the Sky), and now had his own recording company, Musidisc. But what João Gilberto was really anxious to record was a little thing he had remembered, and had been practicing for six months: “O pato” (The Duck).

“Ronaldo, see if you can hear me: ‘O pa-to. O pa-to.’”

João Gilberto left the door of Ronaldo Bôscoli’s apartment open and went to the far end of the hallway, by the elevator. Bôscoli had to stand at the other end, inside the apartment, in order to be as far away from João Gilberto as possible, and see if he could hear him, while the latter whispered as softly as he could, “O pa-to. O pa-to.”

João Gilberto wanted to find out how softly he could enunciate and still be heard, using the hallway as a type of megaphone. And this was how he practiced “O pato.” But Bôscoli’s neighbors weren’t to know that, and at first, they were startled by that man who hung around at the end of the hallway interminably whispering, “O pa-to. O pa-to.”