Cartola

Angenor de Oliveira, known as Cartola (Portuguese for top hat), (Portuguese pronunciation: [kaɦˈtɔlɐ]; October 11, 1908 – November 30, 1980) was a Brazilian singer, composer and poet considered to be a major figure in the development of samba.

Cartola composed, alone or with partners, more than 500 songs.

Biography

The first of eight children of Sebastião Joaquim de Oliveira and Aída Gomes de Oliveira, Angenor was born at Rua Ferreira Viana, 74, in the Catete district of Rio de Janeiro. His name given at birth was actually Agenor, and it was not until the age of 55 that he learned that due to an error in transcription the name on his birth certificate was Angenor. When he was eight his family moved to the Laranjeiras neighborhood in Rio. Due to financial difficulties, the large family moved to Mangueira hill in 1919, where a small favela was beginning to appear, when he was eleven. At age 15, after the death of his mother, he left school to pursue a bohemian lifestyle.

In Mangueira, Cartola soon befriended Carlos Cachaça and other sambistas, getting started in the world of malandragem and samba. In 1928, they founded the Arengueiros Carnival Bloco (street band), which would later turn into GRES Estação Primeira de Mangueira, one of the most loved samba schools in Brazil. Cartola is considered responsible for the choice of colors of the school, light green and pink, as these were the colors of the "rancho do arrepiados" in Laranjeiras where he participated as a boy playing the cavaquinho (a small guitar, similar to a ukulele) that his father had taught him. (The ranchos were precursors to the samba schools in Rio and were composed primarily of descendents of slaves, and featured a king and queen in their performing lines).