País Tropical

Posted on by lyricalbrazil

Lyrics from “País Tropical” by Jorge Ben (1969)

Moro // I live
Num país tropical //In a tropical country
Abençoado por Deus // Blessed by God
E bonito por natureza, mas que beleza // And beautiful by nature (but oh what beauty)

Em fevereiro, em fevereiro // In February (in February)
Tem carnaval, tem carnaval // There’s Carnival (there’s Carnival)
Eu tenho um fusca e um violão // I have a (VW) Beetle and a guitar
Sou Flamengo e tenho uma nega chamada Tereza // I’m Flamengo and I have a nega (a girl) named Tereza

Sambaby, Sambaby // Sam-baby, Sam-baby
Sou um menino de mentalidade mediana // I’m a boy of average mentality
(Pois é) // (That’s right)
Mas assim mesmo levo a minha vida feliz e contente // But even so I lead my life happy and content
Pois não devo nada a ninguém, pois é // Cause I don’t owe anything to anyone (that’s right)
Pois sou feliz // So I’m happy
Muito feliz comigo mesmo // So happy with myself

Moro // I live
Num país tropical // In a tropical country
Abençoado por Deus //Blessed by God
E bonito por natureza, mas que beleza // And beautiful by nature (but oh what beauty)

Em fevereiro, em fevereiro // In February (in February)
Tem carnaval, tem carnaval // There’s Carnival (there’s Carnival)
Eu tenho um fusca e um violão // I have a (VW) Beetle and a guitar
Sou Flamengo e tenho uma nega chamada Tereza // I’m Flamengo and I have a nega (a girl) named Tereza

Sambaby, Sambaby // Sambaby sambaby
Posso não ser um grande líder// I may not be a great leader
Pois é // (That’s right)
Mas assim mesmo lá em casa todos os meus amigos // But even so, in my home all my friends
Meus camaradinhas me respeitam, pois é// My buddies respect me (that’s right)
Essa é a razão da simpatia // That’s the reason for my appreciation
Do poder do algo mais e da alegria// Of the power of something more and of joy

Moro // I live
Num país tropical //In a tropical country
Abençoado por Deus // Blessed by God
E bonito por natureza, mas que beleza // And beautiful by nature (but oh what beauty)

Em fevereiro, em fevereiro // In February (in February)
Tem carnaval, tem carnaval // There’s Carnival (there’s Carnival)
Eu tenho um fusca e um violão // I have a (VW) Beetle and a guitar
Sou Flamengo e tenho uma nega chamada Tereza // I’m Flamengo and I have a nega (a girl) named Tereza

— Commentary —

Jorge Ben in 1972, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/ Fundo Correio da Manhã

I have set myself the challenge of translating a song a week from the playlist that I am using with my History of Rio course at Oberlin College this year. This will mean brief but hopefully much more frequent posts, and hopefully posts that will appeal to people just discovering Brazilian music.

“País Tropical” has to be one of the most popular Brazilian songs of all time, by the great Jorge Ben Jor, who I’ve written about several times before on this blog. It is eminently danceable and evokes the warm and colorful street life of Rio de Janeiro while celebrating how wonderful it is to be Brazilian. That kind of cultural celebration of carioca (someone from Rio) and Brazilian identity has long been an antidote to the “complexo vira-lata” — the “mongrel” or stray-dog complex that Brazilian writer Nelson Rodrigues first identified in 1950 as a characteristic of the Brazilian people. The idea gives name to what Rodrigues — and many after him in turn — identified as a certain pervasive insecurity and dissatisfaction with Brazilian identity, and a striving to be like other nationalities seen as purer and superior. (This often meant emulating northern European and U.S. styles and understandings.) It has become a common way of explaining and understanding Brazilian culture. In that context, a song celebrating the richness of Brazilian life can take on tones of resistance.

The song was initially released by Wilson Simonal in 1969, one of the most repressive years of Brazil’s military dictatorship (1964-85). Simonal made the song a hit, and Gal Costa recorded it soon after, still in 1969, alongside Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso:

In the 1970s, Simonal became persona non grata among the artistic left and much of the public after displaying support for the military dictatorship. But fortunately the song was too powerful to remain attached to Simonal’s reputation or stigmatized for the fact that it celebrated being Brazilian at a time when that was just what the dictatorship was encouraging. Jorge Ben would also record it in 1969, and his version became the one that still excites crowds all over Brazil even though they’ve heard the song a million times before.

The song makes reference to Rio’s most popular soccer team, Flamengo, one of the favorite teams among the masses of Rio and Brazil, and uses the term of endearment nega, which I’ve also written about in this post on Paulinho da Viola’s “Coisas do Mundo, Minha Nega.” VW began to manufacture Beetles in Brazil in the early 1950s, and by the 1960s they were one of the most common and popular little cars on Rio’s streets, as you can see from this 1970 image of Copacabana’s famous calçadão, or big sidewalk.

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Published by lyricalbrazil

My name is Victoria Broadus and I'm currently living in Oberlin, Ohio, where I teach Latin American History at Oberlin College. I learned Portuguese while working toward a Master's degree at Georgetown back in 2008/09, which is also when I began traveling to Brazil. I started this site in late 2011 when I was living in New York City, missing Brazil but fortunate to be surrounded by lots of great opportunities to hear Brazilian music. I wanted to share that music with friends and family and any other readers out there who wonder what the songs they're listening to are saying, and why.  From 2012-2017 I lived in Brazil -- first São Paulo for a year,  then Rio for nearly five -- before coming back to the United States for my PhD program at Georgetown, which I completed in June 2023. Please let me know if there is a song you would like translated or would like to hear more about. You can leave a comment here or anywhere else on the site, or on the Facebook page. You can follow the blog by clicking "Follow" at the bottom of the main page, and follow blog posts and other updates on Facebook: www.facebook.com/lyricalbrazil.

6 thoughts on “País Tropical”

  1. Nice!

    Charles A. Perrone, Professor Emeritus Department of Spanish & Portuguese Studies University of Florida (inquire about physical mailing address for me) ________________________________

  2. This course examines the history of Rio de Janeiro with a primary focus on the 19th and 20th centuries, concentrating on themes of race, inequality, urban space, and popular culture. We work with standard primary and secondary sources along with film, fiction, photography, and music to build our understanding of Rio de Janeiro’s history. Students will hone skills of close reading, viewing, and listening, as well as of careful reflection and persuasive argument in writing.

    Are you gonna post the syllabus?

    Charles A. Perrone, Professor Emeritus Department of Spanish & Portuguese Studies University of Florida (inquire about physical mailing address for me) ________________________________

      1. Sim, ponha-me em dia sobre teu doutoramento e aula/ementa et al. Avanti!

        Charles A. Perrone, Professor Emeritus
        Department of Spanish & Portuguese Studies
        University of Florida
        (inquire about physical mailing address for me)

  3. For a while in the 1980s, my Ex and I traveled frequently to central Mexico, because there was a branch of the family there through a marriage of her uncle. Most of them lived in Jalisco, especially in Guadalajara, but there were relatives in Colima, the D.F., and elsewhere. VW bugs were still being manufactured in Mexico, primarily for the Mexican market, and the familiar name for them was “ombligo.” “Belly button,” because everyone has one.

    Paul Weiss

    >

  4. On August 1, 2024 tune into The Squid for a special edition of dedicated to artists of Italian heritage. It’s part two of a show inspired by the book Bebop, Swing, and Bella Musica: Jazz and the Italian American Experience by Bill Dal Cerro and David Anthony Witter. Part one was on July 25 and can be heard in the Two-Week Archive under the Listen tab on the website ksqd.org. The program airs Thursday 7-10 P.M. PDT. DJCP (Carlo “Pasquale” Perrone) will play all sorts of jazz made by his fellow descendants of Italian extraction. Benvenuti a tutti! Welcome all. KSQD FM 90. 7, 89.7, 89.5 in the broadcast area or streaming @ ksqd.org.

    Charles A. Perrone, Professor Emeritus Department of Spanish & Portuguese Studies University of Florida (inquire about physical mailing address for me) ________________________________

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