The Tropicália movement—which merged Brazilian traditional and avant-garde musical forms with foreign styles, such as psychedelic and blues music—produced perhaps the most significant body of what we Americans call “world music” from the late ‘60s through the mid-‘70s.
Although in theory the movement both came to fruition and ended in 1968, the core members of the movement—including Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Gal Costa, Os Mutantes, and Tom Zé—have produced a rich diversity of music across a vast number of excellent albums throughout subsequent decades. The 1968 album Tropicália ou Panis et Circencis serves as the movement’s manifesto, with all the principal figures involved in its creation.
This playlist features highlights from their collective manifesto Tropicália ou Panis et Circencis and from the debut by each of the major artists individually, all of which came in 1968 except for Gal Costa, released in March of 1969. (No Tom Zé for now—I may revise the playlist sometime to include him.) I’ve woven the albums together to preserve a more collective feel. I don’t speak any Portuguese, so I’ve made my selections strictly on how engaging and compelling I find the music (which isn’t far off from how I treat English-speaking artists, anyway, with some exceptions).
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