Brazil’s Force of Nature

RIO DE JANEIRO — One night about five years ago, legendary Brazilian singer-composer Caetano Veloso attended a dress rehearsal of a theater group in his native city of Salvador de Bahia. One of the actors was a stout, young black woman who had no lines and moved solemnly and ponderously about the stage. Near the end of the performance, the main character died, and the woman stood over him and sang a dirge in Latin.

The voice hit Veloso like a force of nature: majestic, otherworldly, a voice full of the spirituality and tribulation of Afro-Brazilian culture.

The singer was Virginia Rodrigues, the daughter of a market vendor from a poor neighborhood. She was an unknown who sang at weddings and worked as a manicurist to support her fledgling musical career.

“Her voice really impressed me, it was special, unique,” Veloso recalled recently. “Her style is neutral, almost impersonal, yet it contains hidden emotion.”

Today, the 35-year-old Rodrigues has recorded two albums, performed with Brazil’s top artists, and awed audiences and critics in the United States and Europe. Her ascent out of anonymity has become a classic story that reaffirms the role of the state of Bahia as a musical treasure trove.

Rodrigues’ performance Wednesday at UCLA’s Royce Hall--her Los Angeles debut--will feature songs from “Sol Negro” (Black Sun), her 1997 debut album on Hannibal/Rykodisc. Although it includes samba classics, Rodrigues’ work is closer to gospel and classical music than to jazz or the intoxicating rhythms of Brazilian popular song familiar to U.S. listeners.

That familiarity began, in large part, with Carmen Miranda, a talented singer who became known in the U.S. through her somewhat cartoonish appearances in American films in the 1940s and early ‘50s. In the early ‘60s, the bossa nova craze took hold, due primarily to the lush compositions of Antonio Carlos Jobim. Later that decade, Veloso collaborated with Gilberto Gil on the landmark 1968 album “Tropicalia,” which fused Brazilian music with British and American rock and was a response to the cultural conservatism associated with the military dictatorship then in place.

With the return to democracy in 1985, Brazilian music flowered once again. U.S. audiences were reintroduced to the sounds, particularly through compilations produced by David Byrne’s Luaka Bop label beginning in the early ‘90s.

While Brazil’s African influence permeates much of that music, it is almost exclusively secular and commercial. Little of it is so obviously steeped in the various forms of spirituality heard in Rodrigues’ work.

Her voice resonates with echoes of the church choirs and religions that have shaped her life and art: Catholicism, Protestantism and, most recently, Candomble, the Afro-Brazilian religion that is shedding its shackles after centuries of repression.

“When I go on stage, I feel that I become another person,” she said during a recent interview here. “You have to leave yourself and be with the gods. When I sing, I feel as if I am singing with the gods.”

Her repertoire centers on songs from and about Salvador, which has hundreds of beautiful Baroque churches and a history of religious syncretism. Candomble, an outgrowth of religions brought from Africa by slaves, has permeated Catholicism despite the efforts of the Catholic church to stamp it out.

Bahia, the birthplace of Veloso, Gil and younger stars such as Daniela Mercury, is also the cradle of Afro-Brazilian culture. The selections on “Sol Negro,” an album with a stark and stately mood, are melancholy odes to her people.

“Negrume da Noite” (Blackness of the Night) is about the struggle of the slaves. “Noite de Temporal” (Stormy Night) describes fishermen braving a storm. “Adeus Batucada” bids farewell to a dance hall--the samba classic was immortalized by Miranda, but Veloso says Rodrigues’ interpretation gave it unexpected freshness because she never heard Miranda’s recording.

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There is a fundamental political undercurrent to her music, Rodrigues said.

“I protest when I sing. About the condition of the Brazilian people. About the enormous inequality in this country. And I believe a great deal in the black movement.”

During the interview in the offices of Veloso’s production company, Rodrigues looked chubby and imposing in a red dress and long abundant braids. With easy Brazilian cordiality, she expressed wonder at how fast her career has moved since the moment five years ago when she spotted Veloso in the audience at the performance of the Olodum Theater, a popular theatrical group in Salvador.

“I didn’t know he was coming to the play,” she said. “I was already nervous. And when I saw him come in, I got even more nervous.”

Marveling at her power and range, Veloso and other Brazilian stars took Rodrigues under their wing. The first album brought together an impressive collection of heavyweight guest stars: Veloso, Gil, Milton Nascimento and others.

As Veloso points out, Rodrigues sounds far more polished and refined than seems possible given her modest training. Without rejecting samba and the “street music” of her youth, she injects a sacred, operatic quality even into popular song, Veloso said.

“You hear that religious, lyrical influence even though she is a product of popular culture from very humble origins,” he said. “It is a voice of great originality. She does not use vibrato. She achieves a sound that almost sounds like a castrato.”

Among her influences Rodrigues lists great Brazilian artists such as Jobim and Chico Buarque. She also likes gospel music, Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone, Ella Fitzgerald and Bessie Smith. But the top of the pantheon is reserved for a classical diva. “Jessye Norman is my muse,” Rodrigues said.

Beneath her unassuming exterior is a tough-minded professional with a clear sense of direction. Asked if she composes or has considered performing opera, she shakes her head resolutely.

“You can’t do everything,” she said.

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During her acclaimed debut tour of the United States last year, her show was intentionally spare and dramatic. Reviewing her performance at the Bottom Line, the New York Times’ Jon Pareles said she “conjured a timeless, mystical Brazil where nature and spirit worlds meet and where the songs of the Afro-Brazilian pantheon share the purity of Gregorian chant.”

This year, her performances will be backed by a five-man group featuring two drummers, acoustic bass and guitar and a viola. And “the show is a bit different. It’s happier. I dance more.”

There is considerable expectation in Brazil for her second album, due in February. Like “Sol Negro,” Veloso produced it and performs on some numbers. Entitled “Nos” (Us), the album consists of an anthology of traditional songs performed by Bahia’s black samba groups, or blocos, during Carnaval. Rodrigues and Veloso did months of research of Carnaval music in order to assemble the selections.

“I was very apprehensive because they are songs that I had not sung before, although they are the music of my land,” she said.

The result is an important cultural document that reflects Rodrigues’ very personal, strong-willed tastes, according to Veloso.

If her rise continues at the same pace, Rodrigues seems destined to become the latest ambassador of Bahian and Brazilian music. In the United States, France and elsewhere, she notes with pleasure that the composition of the audience often reflects the extent of the African diaspora. She delights in the enthusiastic reception.

“I remember one concert in Belgium, it was very funny,” she said. “There was a little old lady who got up and wouldn’t stop dancing. Finally I had to come down off the stage and dance with her.”

Rodrigues still lives in Bahia and speaks lovingly of her roots there. But she is not averse to traveling and has even talked about living overseas, probably the United States, if the opportunity presents itself.

She complains that her upcoming tour will not give her time to see much more than airports, hotels and concert halls. She dreams of a trip devoted solely to exploring U.S. music. “I’m always running around,” she said. “I’d like to take two months just to go to concerts and listen.”

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Virginia Rodrigues performs Wednesday at 8 p.m. at UCLA’s Royce Hall. Tickets are $9-$30. (310) 825-2101.