Voices of Drought

The Politics of Music and Environment in Northeastern Brazil

Michael B. Silvers

• Publisher: University of Illinois Press
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN:
  9780252083778
  9780252042089
• eBook ISBN:
  9780252050831
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Latin American & Caribbean History

In Voices of Drought, Michael B. Silvers proposes a scholarship focused on environmental justice to understand key questions in the study of music and the environment. His ecomusicological perspective offers a fascinating approach to events in Ceará, a northeastern Brazilian state affected by devastating droughts. These crises have a profound impact on social difference and stratification, and thus on forró music in the sertão (backlands) of the region. At the same time, the complex interactions of popular music and social conditions also help create the environment.

Silvers offers case studies focused on the sertão that range from the Brazilian wax harvested in Ceará for use in early wax cylinder sound recordings to the drought- and austerity-related cancellation of Carnival celebrations in 2014-16. Unearthing links between music and the environmental and social costs of drought, his daring synthesis explores ecological exile, poverty, and unequal access to water resources alongside issues like corruption, prejudice, unbridled capitalism, and expanding neoliberalism.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Chapter 1. Hills, Dales, and the Jaguaribe Valley: Carnauba Wax at the Dawn of Recorded Sound
• Chapter 2. “Help Your Brother”: Drought Songs as Protest
• Chapter 3. The Secret of the Sertanejo: Listening to Forró, Hearing Drought
• Chapter 4. Sounding the Real Backlands: Raimundo Fagner and the Soundscape of Orós
• Chapter 5. Real or Plastic Forró: Soundscapes of a Changing Economy
• Chapter 6. Forró, or Bread and Circuses: Carnival in Times of Drought
• Conclusion
• Notes
• References
• Index