"There are people getting crazy, people naked and enjoying themselves, but there's respect" | Thiago França

“I grew up with the notion that the streets were for poor people to live in. You’re not supposed to be on them. You get in your car, go to work, go home, and you stay home. That’s what the good people do.” I’m chatting to Thiago França, a saxophonist and composer who is an integral part of São Paulo’s music scene as a founding member of Afro-samba-punk trio Metá Metá, as well as a contributor to albums by Criolo, Elza Soares, Céu and many more. Right now, we’re discussing A Espetacular Charanga do França, his riotous carnival troupe. They formed in 2012 just as São Paulo’s Carnaval was returning to the streets after years of being confined to a single venue, the Sambadrome, due to complete indifference from the local government. Now, following a change in governance, street carnival has erupted in São Paulo, making it the most popular Carnaval in Brazil, attracting more revellers than any other in 2019.

A Espetacular Charanga do França are at the heart of its rebirth. The group formed due to this opportunity to perform on the streets, but also because of França’s need to rekindle some lost loves. “In 2012, [Metá Metá] were in a moment of experimentation, playing with lots of pedals, doing this crazy sound,” he says. “I missed the old samba sound from the 60s, instrumental guys like Moacyr Silva and Zé Bodega.” He also had fond memories of listening to the charanga (a brass and percussion band that was once ubiquitous at Brazilian football matches) of his local team, which gave him the idea of starting a similar group. 

His charanga made their first carnaval appearance in 2013 and have been back ever since (pandemic permitting), with the band numbering 90 members (60 brass players and 30 percussionists) in 2019. Their repertoire includes classic carnival rhythms like samba, maxixe and marchinha, but does not confine itself to the past, with baile funk, pagode and even a cumbia cover of Michael Jackson in their arsenal.

In 2019, the band gained notoriety for wearing anti-fascist T-shirts following the election of Jair Bolsonaro: “It’s a very important statement to be made, to be wearing [that] T-shirt on the year this crazy fascist guy gets elected. It’s a way of saying that we have other values.” These ‘other values’ extend to the way São Paulo’s Carnaval has changed, its popularity bringing in commercialisation and people that França describes as “playboy gym-built guys that go everywhere without a shirt, like to drink a lot and fight, and grab women by the hair.” His message to them: “If you are coming here, you’re going to be respectful. It is a lie that Carnaval is a place with no laws, no ethics. It’s not like that at all.” He tells me that kids and old people come out for the charanga too, before concluding, “of course, there are people getting crazy, people naked and enjoying themselves, but there’s respect, and that’s the most important thing.”   

Read the review of The Importance of Being Espetacular in the Songlines Reviews Database

This article originally appeared in the December 2021 issue of Songlines magazine. Never miss an issue – subscribe today