See Sérgio Mendes.

Sérgio Santos Mendes (born Niteroi, 11 February 1… Read Full Bio ↴See Sérgio Mendes.

Sérgio Santos Mendes (born Niteroi, 11 February 1941) is a Brazilian musician. Born the son of a physician in Niteroi, Brazil, Mendes attended the local conservatory with hopes of becoming a classical pianist. As his interest in jazz grew, he started playing in nightclubs in the late-1950s just as bossa nova, a jazz-inflected derivative of samba, was taking off. Mendes played with Antonio Carlos Jobim (regarded as a mentor), and many U.S. jazz musicians who toured Brazil.

Mendes formed the Sexteto Bossa Rio and recorded Dance Moderno in 1961. Touring Europe and the United States, Mendes recorded albums with Cannonball Adderly and Herbie Mann and played Carnegie Hall. Mendes moved to the U.S. in 1964 and cut two albums under the Brasil '65 group name with Capitol Records and Atlantic Records. When sales were tepid, he replaced his Brazilian born vocalist Wanda Sa with the distinctive voice of Chicago native Lani Hall (who learned Mendes' Portuguese material phonetically) and switched to Herb Alpert's A&M label and released Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66. (Hall would later marry Alpert). The album ultimately went platinum based largely upon the success of the single Mas Que Nada and the personal support of Alpert, with whom Mendes toured regularly. Though his early singles with Brasil '66 (most notably Mas Que Nada) met with some success, Mendes really burst into mainstream prominence when he performed the Oscar nominated Burt Bacharach/Hal David song "The Look of Love" on the Academy Awards telecast in March 1968. Brasil '66's version of the song quickly shot into the top 10, eclipsing Dusty Springfield's version from the soundtrack of the movie, and Mendes spent the rest of 1968 enjoying consecutive top 10 and top 20 hits with his follow-up singles, "The Fool on the Hill" and "Scarborough Fair." Though he continued to enjoy adult contemporary chart successes with Brasil '66 through 1971, he would not experience the mainstream chart hits he enjoyed in 1968 until his comeback album in 1983 generated the biggest single of his career, "Never Gonna Let You Go." However, from 1968 on, Mendes was arguably the biggest Brazilian star in the world, enjoying immense popularity worldwide and performing in venues as varied as stadium arenas and the White House, where he gave concerts for both President Johnson and President Nixon.

Mendes' career in the U.S. stalled in the mid-70s, but he remained very popular in South America and Japan. (This disparity became a Seinfeld in-joke.) His two albums with Bell Records in 1973 and 1974, followed by several for Elektra from 1975 on, found Mendes continuing to mine the best in American pop music and post-Bossa writers of his native Brazil, while forging new directions in soul with collaborators like Stevie Wonder, who wrote Mendes' R&B-inflected minor hit, "The Real Thing." In 1983, he rejoined Alpert's A&M records and enjoyed huge success with a self-titled album and several follow-up albums, all of which received considerable adult contemporary airplay with charting singles. By the time Mendes released his Grammy-winning Elektra album Brasileiro in 1992, he was the undisputed master of pop-inflected Brazilian jazz. The late-1990s lounge music revival brought retrospection and respect to Mendes' oeuvre, particularly the classic Brasil '66 albums. He has released over thirty-five albums, and still plays his bossa nova heavily crossed with jazz and funk. His newest album, Timeless released in 2006, featured Chali 2na of Jurassic 5, will.i.am of Black Eyed Peas, Q-Tip, Justin Timberlake, and Pharoahe Monch.

(Text taken in whole from the Wikipedia article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergio_Mendes on March 30, 2006)

Batucada
Sergio Mendes Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

A batucada surgiu
Nem um branco ficou
Pois ser branco é ter cor
E pouco amor . . .

Canta amor que é mais branco
Que o sorriso do negro
Que nasceu só sem cor

Cheio de amor

E vai vivendo
Vendo a vida terminar
Chorando tanto
Por quem nunca pôde amar

Mas a vida se vai
E é preciso sambar
Fazer samba é viver
E não morrer . . .

A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou
A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou
A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou
A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou

E vai vivendo
Vendo a vida terminar
Chorando tanto
Por quem nunca pôde amar

Mas a vida se vai
E é preciso sambar
Fazer samba é viver
E não morrer . . .

A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou
A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou

A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou
A batucada surgiu, nem um branco ficou . . .

Overall Meaning

The lyrics to Sérgio Mendes's song "Batucada" speak to the history and cultural significance of the Brazilian batucada rhythm, which originated in Afro-Brazilian communities. The first line of the song, "A batucada surgiu," translates to "the batucada emerged," drawing attention to the rhythm's origins and roots in black culture. The following line, "Nem um branco ficou," or "not a white person remained," emphasizes the exclusivity of the batucada rhythm, as it was not originally embraced by the white Brazilian elites.

The next two lines, "Pois ser branco é ter cor/E pouco amor," which translate to "because to be white is to have color/and little love," further underscore the racial divides and systemic racism that exist in Brazil. The lyrics that follow, "Canta amor que é mais branco/Que o sorriso do negro/Que nasceu só sem cor/Cheio de amor," or "Sing love that is whiter/Than the smile of the black/Who was born colorless/Full of love," challenge traditional notions of race and beauty, equating the purity of love with a lack of color.

The final lines of the song, "Mas a vida se vai/E é preciso sambar/Fazer samba é viver/E não morrer," or "But life goes on/And we must samba/Making samba is living/And not dying," suggest that despite the struggles and hardships that black Brazilians have faced, they must continue to celebrate and embrace their heritage through the batucada rhythm.

Line by Line Meaning

A batucada surgiu
The rhythm of the batucada originated

Nem um branco ficou
Not a single white person remained

Pois ser branco é ter cor
Because being white is only having a skin color

E pouco amor . . .
And little love in comparison

Canta amor que é mais branco
Sing love, which is whiter

Que o sorriso do negro
Than the smile of a black person

Que nasceu só sem cor
Who was born colorless

Cheio de amor
But full of love

E vai vivendo
And goes on living

Vendo a vida terminar
Watching life come to an end

Chorando tanto
Crying so much