Charanga, 80, struggles to continue displaying ‘the lyrical soul of a people’

There was a time when crowd noise was not part of the football game. Noises bothered.

The stands were no longer exactly silent in the 1940s, but noses turned up when a small band started to attend Flamengo matches. “A charanga”, observed, jokingly, Ary Barroso. The goalkeeper of São Cristóvão complained that the bugles got in the way.

But it was a path of no return.

Public participation was encouraged by clubs, the press and the State itself. The president of the Metropolitan Football Federation, which organized the Campeonato Carioca, was Vargas Netto, nephew of the President of the Republic, Getúlio Vargas. In an article published in Jornal dos Sports, Netto explained that the noise was more than noise.

“It can be an element of sound disturbance in the match panorama, confusing the referee, serving as a ‘key’ for the charanga team, as a warning or command voice. That only the match referee can know”, he wrote, before concluding. : “But it could also just be a demonstration of the lyrical soul of a people”.

It is this soul that has inhabited the body of Charanga Rubro-Negra for eight decades. On October 11, 1942, the Bahian Jayme de Carvalho went to the game that defined the carioca title carrying a banner with the inscription “Avante Flamengo”, in what was marked as day 1 of the traditional organized crowd. Eighty years later, in another setting, Jayme’s followers try to honor his lyrical vocation.

“He was passionate, a passionate flamengo player. He liked music and loved to party, he was a party person, everything was a party for him. And it’s the same thing today. We’re always having a party”, says Grimário Nascimento, 74, Gui Gui, who for more than three decades he has presided over Charanga.

The crowd emerged as Avante Flamengo, but soon adopted the Charanga identity, popularized from the derision of the red-black musician and broadcaster Ary Barroso, who considered the group not very harmonious. “He would say: ‘Oh, it’s out of tune’. But that was a revelry, a desire to sing. I thought it was beautiful, funny, the people making a mess. Bill

He struggles to keep the octogenarian institution standing and asks: “Write there that we don’t have sponsorship”. The fans today need to pay the musicians, who play metallic instruments like the trombone, to continue the tradition.

“It has a cost to function. We have to pay for the group of artists. At the time of Jayme, it was more for love, a group of friends. Things have changed, right? But we are happy with our 80 years, because it is for anyone. In a little while, it will be a centenary”, the president is proud.

In the old days, there were about 30 instrumentalists. There is currently a permit for ten, made possible only by Charanga’s pristine history. Only she can take metals to Maracanã, permission granted because there is no record of violent occurrences.

“Charanga is 80 years old and has never been involved in an episode of violence. This is something that only she has in Brazil, I think in the world. Every organized crowd, no matter how peaceful, has already been involved in some episode”, says Vinicius Felix, 46, a lawyer who helped the entity in 2014, when extinction, as had happened on other occasions, seemed imminent.

“The first objective was not to let Charanga die. The second was to take Charanga back to Maracanã. The third was to document the lineage, show that Jayme’s Charanga is the same as Gui Gui’s Charanga. a Charanga shirt and put it on. He received the baton”, says Felix.

It was the lawyer who drafted the institution’s first statute and gave it a CNPJ, which allowed partnerships such as the one signed with the Espaço Rubro-Negro store, licensed by the Gávea club. Surviving is difficult, but Gui Gui and his companions do their best in a very different scenario from that observed eight decades ago.

The moment of Charanga’s emergence was also the birth of other fan associations, such as Legião da Vitória, from Vasco, in Rio de Janeiro, and Tusp, from São Paulo, in São Paulo. In the context of Vargas’ Estado Novo, which symbolically redefined the meaning of the urban worker, the scenario was favorable for the formation of these groups.

According to historian Renato Coutinho, 40, who researched the process of popularization of football in the last century and is preparing a book on Charanga, a series of factors boosted the birth of organized supporters. The first was the stability of football itself, which “had already overcome its greatest dramas”, such as the clash between professionalism and amateurism. The main clubs were consolidated and encouraged associations – the Legião, for example, was organized within Vasco.

The sports press also played an active role. Faced with the failure of the Cariocas’ audience in 1940 and 1941, O Globo Sportivo and Jornal dos Sports began to debate the reasons for the low attendance and to promote contests among fans, with prizes such as beer kegs.

And it was a matter of state. What led Vargas Netto, directly linked to Getúlio, to defend the expression of the “lyrical soul of a people”.

“It is the idea of ​​a festive people, of a harmonious people, of a people that organize themselves to celebrate, to celebrate. which is a central element of the Estado Novo. And, second, it is also the idea of ​​a harmonious festive worker, who behaves in a civilized way in the public spaces of the city”, says Coutinho.

The organizations back then were quite different from today’s – many born in the 1960s and 1970s as “young” as opposed to old. In old Charanga, swearing was forbidden. But, even with lexical limitations, fan associations were a means of expression for workers in the Estado Novo dictatorship.

“There used to be individual actions by fans. But Charanga and other uniformed supporters will understand the action of fans as a collective force. In the press itself, the term fans are used. It is no longer the fan. , Vasco’s fans. So, these guys start to have more strength”, says Coutinho.

“Organized supporters are examples of association even during a dictatorship. People organize collectively to support a football club, but also to participate in the city’s public life. . The party is a component of this association, but it is not the only one”, adds the historian.

It was in this context that Charanga emerged, as an expression of popular Brazilianness. The orchestrated noise, in tune or not, enchanted an entire generation, with pioneering actions such as dressing the fans in the team’s clothes – before, the audience watched the games with their coats and hats on.

The organized model changed with the emergence of combative “young women”, inspired by the Cuban Revolution and a guerrilla political culture – again, in a dictatorship. But even many of the young people admired Charanga.

Cláudio Cruz, 59, founder of Raça Rubro-Negra, says that Jayme de Carvalho is his biggest idol. “It’s not Zico, it’s not Adílio, it’s not Andrade”, usually says the fan, who wrote a book about the creator of Charanga and demands that a statue be erected in his honor in Gávea.

Jayme died in 1976. His widow, Dona Laura, remained in front of the crowd as long as she was healthy. Afterwards, Gui Gui took care of it, with the help of figures like Cunhado – who had the key to the Maracanã at the time when Charanga had a room in the Mario Filho stadium to store flags and instruments – and many others.

Charanga came close to extinction a few times, but with difficulty, it stayed. The current place is different –including the stadium–, but there is a space for it. In a moment of crisis for the combative organizations – which do not have the support of the press or the players, although they maintain influence in the politics of the clubs –, there is once again an appreciation of the media for figures plucked from the stands, such as Gabigordo, from Flamengo, or Cássio. generic, from Corinthians.

Flamengo’s management has a good relationship with Charanga and welcomed her for an early birthday barbecue.

The horns will sound in the final of the Copa do Brasil.

Today, it is true, there are more metaphorical than literal trumpets in the demanding red-black crowd. But Charanga, 80, lives.