There is great music !

by Tatsuhiko H.
(Tokyo, Japan)

When I think of Brazil, I’m reminded of samba. Do you know it? I have never seen it directly, but have often seen it on TV. It is the representative music of Brazil. Therefore, the country provides that December 2 is Samba Day. On that day, people can buy some scores of samba carnival and have many events.

The origin of samba is not only African dance music, but also European, especially polka and mazurka. So, there are a lot of opinions that the music is not included in African music. Moreover, people who play samba music use salsa and mambo, which are not used in Latin music. Therefore, samba doesn’t belong to Latin music exactly.

Japanese musical artists make many songs which are named “samba.” However, they are not like really samba. It is because samba is mixing with mambo & rumba when it comes in Japan. So we can’t listen to samba exactly, but we can see a samba carnival in Tokyo (in August), Shizuoka (in May), Hyogo (in May), and Okinawa (in November).

If you want to see samba, please check this URL:
http://www.asakusa-samba.org/about.html (Asakusa, Tokyo)