O Africanto Dos Tincoas

Description

The third album from the legendary Bahian trio, originally released in 1975 by Odeon and finally back on vinyl. One of the most spiritually charged records to emerge from Brazil during the years of military dictatorship. Hold on to your hats. Os Tincoãs - Mateus Aleluia, Heraldo, and Dadinho - came from Cachoeira, in the Recôncavo Baiano, a region steeped in Afro-Brazilian traditions where candomblé terreiros and Catholic chapels coexisted, where sacred rhythms were passed down from generation to generation through oral transmission. The group's name refers to a bird native to the Brazilian interior: the Tincoã, a subspecies of the squirrel cuckoo. Their sound was called "africanto" – a term coined to describe their unique fusion of African roots and Brazilian popular song. O Africanto dos Tincoãs deepens the spiritual explorations of their landmark self-titled debut album from 1973. A stripped-down instrumentation – guitar, atabaque, agogô, xequerê – creates space for the extraordinary vocal interplay of the trio: falsetto conduits floating over two-part harmonies derived directly from the call-and-response structures of the Candomblé ritual. The songs evoke the orixás, ancestors, the ocean, exile. Recorded during the darkest years of the Brazilian military regime, when Afro-Brazilian religions faced persecution and surveillance, the album addresses themes of suffering and resilience without ever losing its sweetness and brightness. It is music of silent resistance. The group remained virtually unknown outside of Bahia during its active years. In 1983, Aleluia and Dadinho traveled to Angola and stayed – Aleluia for twenty years, teaching and tracing the Africa-Brazil diaspora from the other side of the Atlantic. Dadinho opened a bakery in Luanda, where he passed away in 2000. Their records fell into obscurity. Then the internet era brought rediscovery. Today, Mateus Aleluia remains active, a living link to a tradition that Os Tincoãs helped preserve and transform. Essential listening. A Holy Grail of Brazilian music finally accessible again. The real deal.