Maria Bethânia turns 80 with the intact pride of her supernatural singing that educates, moves and, often, intoxicates

Maria Bethânia turns 80 this Thursday, June 18
Alicia Coriolano / Reproduction of the cover of the album 'Ciclo' (1983)
♫ MARIA BETHÂNIA 80 YEARS OLD
♬ Born on June 18, 1946, Maria Bethânia turns 80 today with an unassailable trajectory, guided by the loftiness of the supernatural singing that it educates, moves and, often, inebriates.
Moved by the spirituality that governs the artist, a kind of divinity in the pantheon of MPB with whom (almost) no one dares to mess, this song reaches the deepest corners of Brazil without ceasing to sing about the pains of love common to everyone in the countryside or in the city.
Bethania's singing educates because, through her, verses by poets like Fernando Pessoa and Clarice Lispector escaped literary niches and reached the ears of the general public, interpreted by a singer who also speaks to us. It educates by traveling along the road of a hinterland that resists the vices and hits of industrialization. For leading the Brazilian public to the circles of the hometown of Santo Amaro da Purificação (BA), north of the artist's corner.
Bethania's driving force also comes from the voice of her mother, Claudionor Vianna Telles Velloso (1907 - 2012), Dona Canô, who is present in everything Bethânia sings, from the praises of the saints and orixás to the sambas-canção of the radio era.
Bethânia doesn't go with the flow. Bethânia brings the wave, points out what no one saw, suggests paying attention to a composer. What would Roberto Mendes and other great composers from Santo Amaro be like without Bethânia's guiding voice showcasing a work that, without the performer's national prominence, would perhaps have only become known in local haunts?
Bethania's singing is also moving because her deep voice knows how to move between delicacy and drama with rare intelligence.
Admirer of Dalva de Oliveira, star of the radio era, Maria Bethânia brings a high level of theatricality to her singing. This has been the artist's brand since, in February 1965, the debutante took to the theater stage in the Rio neighborhood of Copacabana to take a one-way flight across Brazil, singing "Carcará".
However, owner of the gift and emotions, she also knows how to tone things down if it suits her to ruminate on sorrows, loneliness, resentment or revenge. But when he always sings at the heights, with his veins open to emotion, his imposing eyes in the rapt eyes of the audience.
Averse to labels and fads, Maria Bethânia has spanned six decades of career with fidelity to herself. She fought to be Maria Bethânia and, when she gave in, as in the case of executive Marcos Maynard's suggestion that she record an album with songs by Roberto Carlos in 1993, she did so without lowering her head, with her usual grandeur.
And she did so because all the songs by Roberto, her brother Caetano Veloso, Chicos (both Buarque and César, both recurring in the performer's repertoires), Gonzaguinha, Arnaldo Antunes and Adriana Calcanhotto - among other composers - seemed made for her. Even when they weren't.
And Bethânia's dedication to each song is moving. She purifies the word through singing which, on stage, drowns out arrangements and virtuoso instrumentalists. All attention and eyes are on the interpreter.
Finally, Maria Bethânia's singing is intoxicating because there is something supernatural there. More than just a song in itself, there seems to be a powerful energy when Bethânia releases her voice and gives herself, word for word, to the magic of the stage, with a sparkle in her eyes that has never dimmed in her 63-year career that began in Salvador (BA).
Maria Bethânia is as big as Mangueira, which celebrated the existence of Menina de Oyá in the 2016 Carnival champion parade, on the occasion of the artist's 70th birthday. The first station of Brazilian music in this 2026 in which there is no longer the physical presence of most of the great MPB singers who emerged in the 1960s, Maria Bethânia needs explanation, as does Mangueira. Although we try to find something to celebrate, on the singer's 80th birthday, this supernatural strength that still seems far from drying up.
♫ Read other texts about Maria Bethânia's 80th birthday:
♬ Maria Bethânia 80 years old: discover eight less heard (but no less relevant...) albums by the singer
♬ Maria Bethânia 80 years old: discover 80 recordings that attest to the performer's great strength in six decades of recording

Source: G1