The brazilian party is an initiative that seeks to give an end to that violent stigma.
by GG Albuquerque | Translation: Eutrópio Édipo
The bregafunk of Recife has spread throughout Brazil. In 2019, the genre more than doubled in audience on Spotify. In February, the producer JS O Mão de Ouro placed four out of the five most played songs on the platform, but the history of this movement from Pernambuco has deeper and older roots.
As the name indicates, the bregafunk descends from the funk carioca. And Recife has a history in funk. Since the end of the 80’s and especially in the 90’s, sound teams like Milkshake and Mastermix and DJs like Ricardinho and Ivanildo, among many others, rock parties with thousand of people in the city.
Those parties had their height in the beginning of the 2000’s, being the most famous the Rodoviário Club Baile also called Rodó Baile (in Imbiribeira neighborhood, South Zone of Recife) and Teo’s Baile (in Casa Amarela, North Zone). It was at those baile funk parties that many brega MCs began their careers, including stars such as Dadá Boladão, MC Troia e Shevchenko & Elloco.
Those bailes got closed for many years due to the violence between neighborhoods and police repression, but the funk music from Pernambuco isn’t dead. There is an event resuming the tradition: the Peace Baile, held by the team Funk Antigo de Pernambuco — FAPE (Old Funk from Pernambuco), since 2016 with the proposal to revere funk classic styles.
In the old days, the baile funk parties in Recife were divided into different bondes (or gangs) which represented their neighborhoods and rivaled other communities in fighting rituals.
A “corridor” used to be formed where members of different bondes danced beating each other, resembling a circle pit — just like it happened at the bailes funks in Rio de Janeiro. But this dispute was also mixed with drug trafficking, especially with the rivalry of the supporters’ association of the city’s soccer teams. Thus, the conflicts became heavier at the turn of the decade from 1990 to the 2000's.
The Peace Baile is an initiative that seeks to give an end to that violent stigma. Bondes from different neighborhoods attend the party with the intention of enjoying without fighting in parties held at the Recreational Club of Compesa in the neighborhood of Engenho do Meio (Recife).
The PV (acronym for Praia Verde — Green Beach) from the neighborhood of Rio Doce, in Olinda, is one of the main ones of those bondes. We followed the PV bonde on a bus ride rented by them. We were welcomed by MC Feru, a veteran who is one of the leaders of PV and does everything to discipline his bonde fellows. “All the bondes go there to have their party, we won’t fight, we won’t do anything” warned the singer repeatedly during the bus trip to the court where the baile happens.
“I know that some younger boys want to go just to fight. I’ve already had their age and I’ve been in that place. I don’t judge. But I warn them that it is a peace baile. You can only go if you play cool”, tells us while he waited for the bus rented by him with a share from the bonde. In fact, one of the team’s guidelines is “to promote good cohexistence and healthy interaction among the participants, bringing the idea of mutual respect among all, not only inside but also outside the baile”.
In fact, balance and peace are more complicated. As the afternoon comes to an end, and the party continues into the night, often the MCs have to interrupt the music and ask for calm because a fight between bondes has begun — and it is up to the veterans of bondes to break up and calm down. At the last baile we went to, the situation became more tense than usual.
A big fight was formed that didn’t even stop after a series of appeals from the organization of the event and MCs. The problem was only solved when an evangelical pastor — who came out from where nobody could know — went on stage and started a preaching that calmed everyone’s nerves.
Even with those eventual conflicts, the Peace Baile prevails as a space to affirm identity of the neighborhoods. The big flags of the bondes are placed in the court one day before the party and often bring homage to residents who have died.
The MCs also sing songs that exalt their peripheries, building an effective memory for those urban areas that do not appear on postcards and do not make up Recife’s tourist circuit. At one point, a man in a wheelchair was lifted by the public, showing how funk can include all people, regardless their physical condition.
Most of the participants are male. But in that edition of the event was celebrated the anniversary of the bonde Elas no Funk. The women occupied the stage, singing songs exalting their group while danced at the court, showing the transformation of the funk environment.
At the dance, men and women dance in pairs. They hold hands while spin and throw each other in the air doing pirouettes. Trust in each other and solidarity are the fundamental elements of those movements.
What allows them to execute the acrobatic jumps and prevents them from falling is precisely the support of the partner. Deep down, this dance is the metaphor that symbolizes the Peace Baile: it is the force of friendship and solidarity without which it is impossible to fly.
