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Cegos rabequeiros cantadores of Northeast Brazil: Manifestation of the Blind Poet-Singer and Blind Fiddler Archetypes

2023; Programa de Pós-graduação em Música (USP); Volume: 23; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.11606/rm.v23i1.208018

2238-7625

Jorge Linemburg,

Music History and Culture

This article addresses the poetic, musical universe of cegos rabequeiros cantadores [blind singing fiddlers] in Northeast Brazil. These performers expressed themselves through a poetics in which their circumstances as men deprived of vision and their instruments became themes that inspired their artistic creations. Such a manifestation incorporated the archetypes of the blind poet-singer and the blind fiddler, widely diffused both geographically and historically, as do the poetic, musical elements of two traditional figures from the same region: the blind man who begs for alms while singing and the northeastern cantador [singer]. Most of these rabequeiros depended on handouts to survive, begging in exchange for songs accompanied by the rabeca [Brazilian fiddle].