As Mais Belas Cantigas de Roda

Between a CD with Sagrado Coração da Terra and a new soundtrack for a TV series, Marcus Viana always finds time for a youthful audience. After the Christmas CDs that he has been producing for five years, he released As Mais Belas Cantigas de Roda, a collection of 50 songs from different parts of Brazil and other countries. For the singers, the recording was a lark. Olívia Viana tells of "very funny things happening." She was referring to the sounds of a clown being imitated on the disc. But Carmem Pereira Guerra thinks about the children of her generation: "The disc can encourage children to listen to other kinds of music." Bárbara Augusta Vaz de Melo went even further: "It is a way to recover music lost in the memory of our grandparents." Marcus Viana travelled into the past and made interesting discoveries concerning Brazilian musical origins. "Not only tropical rhythms are at the roots of our music, but waltzes, polkas, emboladas, forrós, and schottisch, as well," he said. The 50 songs were joined into a potpourri, and two of them -- "Indiozinhos" (Three Little Indians) and "Sítio do Vovô Tito" (Old MacDonald) -- were taken from North American folklore, long ago incorporated into the universe of Brazilian children.