In Latin America, the largest country, the popularity of samba, there is such a saying: people do not distinguish between men and women, young and old, usually jumping, more jumping on holidays; jumping on the stage, jumping on the street; jumping during the day, jumping all night. Whenever the sound of exciting music, people are always passionate, can not help but swinging legs and waist, jumping up, like a drunk, can not stop, want to rest hard to stop.
Samba originated in Africa. The word "samba" is said to have evolved from the second largest Angolan tribe in Africa, the Kimbundu language "Samba". "Samba" was originally a kind of exciting belly dance. As the name suggests, the dance is characterized by the up-and-down shaking of the abdomen and the shaking of the hips. It was one of the most popular dance movements in Angola and began to spread with the rise of the slave trade. For more than 300 years, from the 1630s to the mid-19th century, Portuguese colonizers trafficked 12 million black slaves from Angola and other parts of Africa to Brazil. In cramming black slaves into the holds of ships bound for the newly discovered continent of Latin America, white slave traders feared that the long journey, with black slaves nestled in the holds for dozens of days at a time, would not fetch a good price when they arrived on shore with weak legs. Therefore, they rushed the black slaves who were crowded in the cabins to the deck every day, and let them dance a samba to the accompaniment of banging on the wine barrels and iron pots, so as to move their muscles. In this way, the colonizer's move, which was intended to enhance the bidding power of the Negro slaves as a special commodity, inadvertently brought this dance, which was popular in Africa, to Latin America.
According to some evidence, the samba was first popularized in Brazil around Salvador, the capital of Bahia. Originally, this is the first place where the Portuguese landed in Brazil to colonize. They ran a large number of plantations and mining sites here. The black slaves, who were trafficked to the plantations and mining fields, danced this hometown dance for fun after the heavy labor. In later centuries, black slaves and their descendants from Africa had more contact with whites from all over Europe and gradually integrated with indigenous Indians. As a result, their dances gradually absorbed some elements of the Bohemian polka from Europe, the Habanera from Cuba and the locally popular Brazilian Maxiche dance, gradually forming the modern samba. It is recorded that it was the women of Bahia who brought this dance to Rio de Janeiro, the then capital of Brazil, at the beginning of the 20th century. Since then, the dance has spread from the coast to the interior, from the slums to the upper class, from the blacks and mulattos to the whites. At the same time, the six-string guitar and ukulele that had been the main instruments of accompaniment in Spain were gradually replaced by percussion instruments such as brass drums, gongs and cymbals, which were used in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, where the first samba school, "Let's Gossip", was established in 1928, and where the first samba parade, "Valentine's Day Samba Parade", was held in 1932. In 1932, Brazil held the first Valentine's Day Samba Parade Observation Competition, which was welcomed and praised by the people. From then on, modern samba soon became popular throughout Brazil.
Samba is a collective social dance, the participants are less dozens of people, more than tens of thousands of people. The dance is accompanied by drums, gongs and other percussion. The steps of this dance are simple, with the feet moving forward and backward, the body leaning sideways and swaying back and forth. Male and female dancers dance in pairs in situ or around the ballroom with each other, or they can be separated to dance their own steps. Male dancers are fond of all kinds of dexterous movements of their feet, moving or rotating their feet rapidly. Female dancers focus on upper body shaking and abdominal and hip twisting. Samba can be performed in ballrooms and on the stage, but more often it is performed in groups in open squares and streets. The dancers form a circle or a double row, singing and dancing. The dancers are wild and uninhibited, with large movements and strong rhythms, giving people a feeling of passion like fire. And drums, brass drums, tambourines and other percussion instruments at the same time and work, high-pitched and intense, the sound waves rolling, and more to create a tense, hot, fiery atmosphere. When this atmosphere reaches a climax, the music often comes to an abrupt end, and the difficult dance dynamics are instantly condensed into a sculpture-like static that is silent. The instantaneous change of motion and stillness, the amazing harmony of the ups and downs, creates a unique sense of surprise and shocking beauty.
More colorful for the samba, is the actor's gorgeous costumes. Both men and women are dressed in colorful costumes. Male actors foot boots, wearing the same vest as the ancient European knights, or draped in African big chief-style robes. The female actors were more elaborately dressed. They are either wearing the body wrapped tightly around the beautiful pattern of the floor-length dress, or just hanging on the small can not be smaller, nearly naked "three-pointed", or even completely bare chest, only in the nipple painted a little colorful decorations. Their headdress is more chic, or wearing a gorgeous crown, or insert colorful bird feathers, or top a fire like plumes. Colorful dress is also full of colorful beads and jewels. Whenever the sound of dance music, modern lights flashing, clothing that is with the dance steps fluttering, beads and jade with the lights flow, like a group of flames flickering, such as a shooting star flying around, forming a dreamlike world. Being in it, one feels like floating in the air, and one's soul soars. Created by Liu Hongping.