Launching Ary’s songs in the USA Before Walt, there were Carmen, André, and Eddy. Daniella Thompson 24 May 2005 A Pequena Notável was the sensation of the Broadway musical revue Streets of Paris. Carmen Miranda arrived in the United States in May 1939. Her Broadway debut in the musical Streets of Paris was such a success that within a few months she was shooting her first Hollywood film, Down Argentine Way. On 26 December 1939, Carmen recorded six songs from the musical and the film in an album entitled The South American Way (Decca 109). But the American audience wouldn’t wait that long to hear Carmen, so her Decca career was launched with reissues of six Brazilian recordings, three of them composed by Ary Barroso. One of these was the samba-batuque “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” (or, as it was spelled then, “No Taboleiro da Bahiana”), a lively duet that Carmen had sung with Luiz Barbosa to the accompaniment of the conjunto regional of Pixinguinha and Luperce Miranda. Image courtesy of Dijalma M. Candido Luiz and Carmen sang: No tabuleiro da baiana tem Vatapá, ôi, carurú Mungunzá, ôi, tem umbú... pra ioiô Se eu pedir você me dá... Lhe dou ...o seu coração o seu amor de Iaiá? No coração da baiana tem... Sedução, ôi, canjerê Ilusão, ôi, candomblé Pra você Juro por Deus, pelo Sinhô do Bonfim Quero você, baianinha inteirinha p’rá mim Sim, mas depois o que será de nós dois? Teu amor é tão fugaz, enganador [Mentirosa, mentirosa, mentirosa] Tudo já fiz, fui até num canjerê Pra ser feliz, meus trapinhos juntar com você Sim, mas depois vai ser mais uma ilusão Que no amor quem governa é o coração... After Carmen and Luiz Barbosa had recorded the song but before their record was released, “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” received its world première in the musical revue Maravilhosa, produced by Jardel Jércolis and Geysa Bôscoli. Here it was sung to great acclaim by the paulista starlet Déo Maia and the diminutive actor-singer Grande Otelo, both of whose careers were greatly bolstered by the sensational success of this production. In his biography Carmen Miranda, a Cantora do Brasil (1978), Abel Cardoso Junior quotes a 1937 interview with Ary Barroso in the revista Carioca, in which the composer confessed: First, you must know that “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” was the first song I sold, so little did I believe in its merit. It was commissioned from me by Jardel Jércolis, who intended to include it in one of the revues of his repertory company. The song was more manufactured than inspired. I produced it more or less by force and ended up composing it in the mold of a “batuque” I had created some years earlier and that had been recorded by Sílvio Caldas with little success [“Batuque” (Victor 33463-A) 1931]. When “Tabuleiro” was ready, I sold its theatrical rights to the well-known impressario, something I had never done before and that I have never repeated. Image courtesy of Dijalma M. Candido Recorded on 29 September 1936 and released in November of that year, “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” (Odeon 11402-B) was as much a hit on record as it had been on stage. Although it came out at the end of the year, the song not only landed in the top 100 songs for 1936 but snagged fifth place in record sales and radio air play. Such was the success of “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” that Ary repeated the formula the following year in the samba-jongo “Quando Eu Penso na Bahia,” which the composer designated as chapter 2 of the series. Carmen recorded it with Sílvio Caldas on 17 September 1937 (Odeon 11540-A). It was one of Carmen’s six Brazilian sides that Decca would release in 1939. In Brazil, “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” had been released on the flip side of Ary Barroso’s marcha “Como ‘Vaes’ Você?” The U.S. edition (Decca 23096) replaced the A side selection with the more successful “Boneca de Pixe” (Ary Barroso/Luiz Iglésias). Another light-hearted duet, this so-called ‘cena carioca’ of 1938 featured Almirante as Carmen’s male partner, with accompaniment by the Odeon Orchestra under the direction of Simon Bountman. The Library of Congress Audio Collection contains both the original Odeon disc and the American Decca release. While the LoC database correctly identifies Luiz Barbosa as the male singer in the Brazilian recording of “No Tabuleiro da Baiana,” the entry for the U.S. recording mysteriously claims Almirante as the vocalist. Carmen’s first U.S.-recorded album The third Ary Barroso composition released among Carmen’s first six sides was the samba-jongo “Quando Eu Penso na Bahia” (Odeon 11540-A). This song had been recorded on 17 September 1937 and released in December of that year. Yet another duet, it features lyrics by Luiz Peixoto, Sílvio Caldas as Carmen’s singing partner, and Grupo da Odeon as accompanists. Many people think that Walt Disney introduced Ary Barroso to the United States, but it was Carmen, with these three duets of 1936, ’37, and ’38, who rightfully takes the credit. She said as much in an interview with Alex Viany, published in the magazine O Cruzeiro in November 1948: I know that I have contributed enough toward spreading Brazilian popular music abroad. But it’s also true that I had a lot of luck. In the first place, I had the luck of having been the first to bring numbers like “Tico-Tico,” “Mamãe, Eu Quero,” “Cai, Cai,” “O que é que a baiana tem?,” “Na Baixa do Sapateiro,” “No Tabuleiro da Baiana,” and so many others to the United States. The American public had never heard such things, and naturally became enthusiastic—even without understanding the words. [...] Naturally, not every Brazilian samba becomes a hit in the U.S. There are gorgeous sambas that could never be understood here. When the American public likes something, it really likes it. This is what happened with “Tico-Tico,” which continues to be frequently played and has already become a kind of popular classic. Like “Aquarela do Brasil” and “Na Baixa do Sapateiro” and few others, “Tico-Tico” is one of the few sambas that Americans can recognize from the first beat. That’s why they’re the only ones that the orchestras always play. And when I try to sing something new, something different, I’m never applauded as much as when I sing one of these. The same happens with all the other Brazilian singers and composers who live in the United States. [...] In one of the films I made in Hollywood, I insisted that the director include among the musical numbers “No Tabuleiro da Baiana,” to be sung by me and Cesar Romero. We even got around to rehearsing it. But when the time came, the director steadfastly refused to include the song I like so much. Pleading didn’t help. The explanation convinced me: “Carmen, here you have to make music that pleases Brazilians, Americans, and Europeans. If you pleased only the Brazilians, you wouldn’t be here anymore.” André Kostelanetz and the CBS orchestra in 1931 (photo courtesy of maurice-abravanel.com) Perhaps it was the partner or the forgettable film (Weekend in Havana, Springtime in the Rockies, or The Gang’s All Here) rather than the song that was wrong, for “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” appears to have made a lasting impression on the conductor André Kostelanetz. From the early 1930s through ’50s, Kostelanetz (1901–1980) fronted several enormously popular series of radio programs. In Popular Music for Orchestra, Dick O’Connor describes the Kostelanetz formula: The juxtaposition of concert, operatic, folk, and popular music had become a standard practice on singer-oriented ‘good music’ programs. Kostelanetz extended this juxtaposition to include excerpts from the more sacrosanct symphonic literature and clever, refined orchestral adaptations of theatre songs. The unstated but intentional implication of this format was that Broadway’s best tunesmiths were, in their own way, the equals of Beethoven, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and other ‘serious’ composers, a suggestion that resonated greatly with an America doing its best to cope with the effects of the depression. The melodies featured were not those of the middle-European operetta heritage that dominated the good music shows, but the recent stage and Hit-Parade successes of Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Richard Rodgers, Cole Porter, Duke Ellington, Noel Coward, Harold Arlen, and Hoagy Carmichael. [...] In planning and execution, in coherence and attention to detail, in orchestrational elegance and ensemble virtuosity and unity his Chesterfield shows (1934–38), Tune-Up Time (1939–40), and The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (1940–44) had no superiors. As early as 25 September 1939 (only a few months following Carmen’s arrival on the American scene and presumably just after her Brazilian recordings had hit the U.S. market), “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” made its debut on Kostelanetz’s CBS program Tune-Up Time. The samba became one of those tunes “that the orchestras always play” and the most frequently executed Ary Barroso composition on the conductor’s radio programs. Kostelanetz also conducted it on screen in the movie Music in My Heart (1940), starring Tony Martin and Rita Hayworth.

Author/s	Song	Performer/s	Radio Program	Tape No.	Air Date
Ary Barroso	No Tabuleiro da Baiana (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	Tune-Up Time (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5127 12A2	25 September 1939
Ary Barroso	No Tabuleiro da Baiana (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	Tune-Up Time (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5127 16A2	1 January 1940
Ary Barroso	No Tabuleiro da Baiana (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5855 r16A2	25 January 1942
Ary Barroso/S.K. Russell	Brazil (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra w/ vocalist Allan Jones	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS) “From musical film Saludos Amigos, based on Spanish [sic] tune ‘Arquela do Brasil’”	Library of Congress LWO 5585 r20B1	31 May 1942
Ary Barroso	No Tabuleiro da Baiana (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5855 r23B1	13 September 1942
Ary Barroso/Luiz Peixoto	Brasil Moreno (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5855 r25B1	22 November 1942
Ary Barroso/Luiz Peixoto	Brasil Moreno (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5855 r26B1	17 January 1943
Ary Barroso/Luiz Peixoto	Brasil Moreno (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5855 r31B1	13 June 1943
Ary Barroso/S.K. Russell	Brazil (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5855 r33B1	15 August 1943
Ary Barroso/Luiz Peixoto	Brasil Moreno (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress RXA 9750 B1	2 April 1944
Ary Barroso/S.K. Russell	Brazil (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress RXA 9751 A2	8 October 1944
Ary Barroso	No Tabuleiro da Baiana (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	The Pause That Refreshes on the Air (CBS)	Library of Congress LWO 5913 r9A2	3 December 1944
Ary Barroso/Ray Gilbert	Baía (samba)	André Kostelanetz & Orchestra	Music Millions Love (CBS) “From musical film The Three Caballeros”	Library of Congress RGA 4125 track 7	1 November 1945
Ary Barroso	No Tabuleiro da Baiana (samba)	André Kostelanetz & string orchestra	The André Kostelanetz Show	Library of Congress RXA 9757 B	1946

But it wasn’t always the Americans who weren’t able to gauge the potential success of a given samba. Why the artistic direction at Odeon selected “Como ‘Vaes’ Você?” for the A side of “No Tabuleiro da Baiana” is no clearer than the reason for making “Na Baixa do Sapateiro” (no. 4 in the 1938 Brazilian charts) the B side of the now obscure “Salada Mista.” Also unclear is why Carmen never released “Na Baixa do Sapateiro” on disc in the United States. It seems that it was left up to Disney (most likely at Aloysio de Oliveira’s urging) to claim the distinction of having introduced the tune in this country. That did not happen until early 1945, when The Three Caballeros was released. “Aquarela do Brasil” didn’t have to wait so long. It was released in the 1942 Disney film Saludos Amigos. But this time someone had beaten Disney to the punch. On 4 September 1941, while Disney was still on his Good Neighbor visit to South America, society pianist Eddy Duchin and his orchestra recorded “Aquarela” with vocalist Tony Leonard singing in Portuguese (Columbia 36400). How did Duchin discover the song? Simple: he had just returned from Rio de Janeiro, where he performed at the Cassino de Copacabana. Duchin’s “Aquarela” recording was quickly followed in December ’41 by Xavier Cugat and his Waldorf-Astoria Orchestra, with vocalist La Chata & Chorus (Columbia 36651). So it transpired that even without Disney’s help, “Aquarela do Brasil” quickly became one of those tunes that “the orchestras always play.” = = = Autor: Ary Barroso Título: No Tabuleiro da Baiana Gênero: Batuque Intérprete: Carmen Miranda & Luiz Barbosa Gravadora: Odeon Número: 11402-B Matriz: 5401 Data Gravação: 29.09.1936 Data Lançamento: Nov/1936 Autor: Ary Barroso Título: Sem Ela; No Tabuleiro da Baiana Intérprete: Ary Barroso (piano) Gravadora: Odeon Número: 11859-A Matriz: 6136 Data Gravação: 20.06.1939 Data Lançamento: Jun/1940 Autor: Ary Barroso/Luiz Peixoto; Ary Barroso Título: Brasil Moreno; No Tabuleiro da Baiana Gênero: Sambas Intérprete: Trio Surdina Gravadora: Musidisc Número: M-15010-B Matriz: MD-2020 Data Lançamento: Set/1955   Articles Copyright © 2005–2013 Daniella Thompson. All rights reserved.