Samba: It's More Than Just a Dance. It's Music!

When one thinks of Samba, they usually envision the dancing and social events, such as Carnival, that come along with it. Yet Samba is so much more. It is a political statement, it's way of life, and it's music! While it's important to give credit and admiration to the dances of samba, one must admire and not forget the music and instruments that make these beautiful and breathtaking dances possible.


Many instruments are used to create the many rhythms of samba, and each instrument is unique in it's own way. They are made out of various materials such as wood and metal, and they create their own distinctive sound.


While the samba of today does use more well known and common instruments such as piano, guitar, clarinets, and so on, samba music still uses many of the African instruments that were used generations ago.

Instruments of Samba


Atabaque drums

According to Drum Journey, "the Atabaque is a traditional drum used to play rhythms for "Capoeira" (Brazilian dance / martial arts). This drum has a barrel-like stave shell construction, is rope tuned, and headed with cowhide. The atabaque may also use a wooden base for additional sound reinforecement. Together the atabaque and berimbau make the capoeira "roda" sound."

Agogo clapperless double bell


This double bell is used in Afro-Brazilian urban traditions such as Candomble and Carnaval. It is a traditional Yoruba instrument. In candomble ceremonies, the agogo sets the pulse at the start of each song and it usually doesn't change it in the course of the song. The agogo is played by striking the instrument with a metal stick.

Friction drum


This drum is known by many different names. In Bahia it is known as cuica. In Sao Paulo it is known as puita, and in the area of Angola it is called pwita. This instrument can add an "inimitable, often humorous, flavour" to a song. According to the World Musical Instruments, this drum is played in a very unique way. "A thin stick is attached to the center of the drum head, and goes into the interior of the drum. The drum is usually held on your lap so you can have one hand inside the drum and the other hand on the head of the drum. The drummer rubs the stick up and down with a wet cloth using the hand inside the drum. The friction from the rubbing motion produces a squeaky sound, and the pitch is varied by changing the thumb pressure." It is able to create animal-like sounds raging from a small squeak to an all mighty roar.

Finally Recognizing Samba as a Type of Music

Many people don't realize that Samba can also be designated as a kind of music as well. Samba has been around for generations, but according to Peter Fryer in his book Rhythms of Resistance it wasn't until 1917 that the word samba began to be connected with the idea of music. It was in 1917 that the carnival hit 'Pelo Telephone' by Donga came out. It's success allowed Samba to be recognized as not only dance but also as a type of music. Of course 'Pelo Telephone' wasn't the first song to be categorized or recorded under the name of Samba. There were dozens of other recordings that had claimed to be samba years before 'Pelo Telephone' was released. A few examples are Joao Gualdo Ribero's piece 'Brasilians' in 1910 that had been played on piano,and 'Urubu Malandro' from 1914 which contained the clarinet, ukelele, and guitar. Despite the fact that these recordings of Samba came first, 'Pelo Telephone' is often mistaken as the first recording under the name of samba because as Fryer writes it "was simply the first piece of music to gain national success under the name 'samba'." Or as stated by Paul F. Clifford in his work Origins of Samba 1916-1928, the recording of "Pelo Telephone' allowed the term samba to be truly commercialised as a popular music form.

Background on the song and the person who samba as a type of music on the map

Donga (Ernesto Woaquim Maria dos Santos) is given credit with composing the first samba carnavalesco song. The song, in it's original version, contained 'a sly dig at police corruption: the practice of warning the owners of gambling dens that they could shortly expect a police raid' (Fryer). However this was toned down in the recorded version. The song was recorded by the Oita Batutas in 1917 and became a hit when performed at Carnvial.
According to Clifford, "Donga’s music was influenced by his frequent visits to the house of Tia Ciata, a Condomble priestess from the state of Bahia who lived near the Praça Onze in Rio de Janeiro. Praça Onze was the gathering place of ex-slaves and immigrants from the northeast of Brazil. There, the young musician encountered music forms like the samba de roda (ring samba), the jongo, and the afoxé."



While 'Pelo Telephone' is still thought of as the first recorded samba, there is still an ongoing debate if in fact 'Pelo Telephone' an actual samba. Many claim that it is not samba but maxixe. (Maxixe is "the successor to the lundu and forerunner of the urban samba" (Fryer) It has a buoyant melodic line and eight-bar sections, in an ABACA form. It's similar to polka and tango.) This debate as been going on for more that 70 years, and it still hasn't been officially decided if 'Pelo Telephone' can be thought of as a true samba. While this debate may be ongoing, it doesn't change the fact that since it's debut at Carnaval in 1917, the song as remained in the history of samba. Afterall you can't look up samba music without finding a reference to 'Pelo Telephone' or Donga!
Click here to read a debate between Ismeal Sliva, one of the founders of Rio's first Samba school, and Donga.
Below is a video featuring the song 'Pelo Telephono'.






Samba, in it's many different forms, has evolved and been adopted by other through out the years. Which ever way you think of samba, either you think of it as a dance, a political statement, a social event, we can not forget that it's the music that makes the dance of samba possible.

by Clarissa Morales

Works Cited
Clifford, Paul. Origins of Samba. Dance Survival Guides. http://www.geocities.com/sd_au/samba/sambanotes2.html

Freyer, Peter. Rhythms of Resistance. New England: Wesleyan University Press, 2000

World Musical Instruments. “Cuica Brazilian Friction Drum.” 20, Feb, 2007. http://worldmusicalinstruments.blogspot.com/2007/02/cuica-brazilian-friction-drum.html

World Precussion Instruments Glossary. Drum Journey. http://www.drumjourney.com/world/instr/index.htm