Luca Argel: Samba carries history

Samba is as important in Brazil as it’s in Portugal, “because this concerns the history of our social composition, the social compositions that exists in Brazil today and is largely inherited from what colonization has left us.” And is based on this reflection that Luca brought his first album to the light.

Luca is a singer from Rio de Janeiro. He found his second home in between Lisbon and Porto, after a masters degree. Now he sings the history. Samba is as important in Brazil as it’s in Portugal, “because this concerns the history of our social composition, the social compositions that exist in Brazil today and is largely inherited from what colonization has left us.” And is based on this reflection, that Luca brought his first album to the light.

Luca Argel in the studio during his interview // Mariana Serrano When “Samba de Guerrilha” began, it came about, not as an album, but as a conference. In 2016, Luca Argel wrote it during the impeachment of Dilma Rousseff, President of Brazil at the time. The creation came from the will to tell a little about the history of Brazil in the perspective of samba: from slavery to Brazilian culture until samba arrives. In Luca words: “Much of the social relations in Brazil, how they are reflected, as they are later repeated in the way samba portrays”. In 2019 was challenged to turn the show into an album. The covers are transformed: with a new sonority, the arrangement brings to nowadays the past, “transgress with respect”. The music come from artists like Cartola, Alfredo Português, Nelson Sargento and Maurício Tapajós. The selection of covers has a specific reason. The music is a part of the history that Luca want to tell: “I think that adds a lot of value to history, having these testimonies in the form of music by the composers who lived it. The covers are kind of a document.”

Luca Argel in Escola Superior de Comunicação social // Mariana Serrano For the future, Luca has plans to start publishing songs written by himself. Using music as a “weapon” to solve problems. Even if it can solution all itself, the voice will keep being a part of the arsenal. Written by: Mariana Serrano