Brazil presidential race ramps up with catchy campaign earworms

BRASILIA, Aug 13 - As presidential campaigns ramp up in Brazil, the frontrunners are making their pitches to voters in a medium the nation is famous for: irresistible grooves.

A nostalgic riff on a funk carioca classic celebrates the working-class roots of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. His leading challenger, Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, has a foot-stomping country anthem steeped in faith and rural culture.

Both draw on a rich tradition of campaign jingles in a country where street vendors and sound trucks have long gotten feet moving with catchy tunes.

But the contrasts in their choice of genres, lyrics and images in accompanying music videos speak volumes about how the race is shaping up.

FAVELA FUNK

"Silva's Rap" borrows from a 1995 hit in the baile funk scene that sprang from the slums of Rio de Janeiro to tell the story of Lula's rise from humble origins to become a union leader, president and now an icon of the global left.

"He was just another Silva," goes the refrain borrowed from the original, using Brazil's most common surname to connect the three-term president with the common man.

"He has the soul of the people and looks like one of us," the song continues over a montage of highlights from the 80-year-old president's public life.

For MC Bob Rum, who wrote the original 1995 track, its role in a presidential campaign marks a coming of age for a genre long stigmatized for its humble origins and provocative lyrics.

"This could not have happened even 10 years ago. Our generation suffered a lot of persecution," he said.

Marcelo Vitorino, an electoral marketing consultant and professor, said Lula's use of rap and funk was aimed less at persuading new voters than at energizing his progressive base.

"It's the space of the marginalized — the outskirts, funk, and rap. That's already Lula's territory. So maybe he's trying to rally a dedicated following for a battle," Vitorino said.

HEARTLAND ANTHEM

By contrast, the conservative 45-year-old Senator Bolsonaro, only slightly trailing in the polls, has released "Come With Faith," an AI-generated song which eschews the candidate's biography to focus on the promise of a brighter tomorrow.

With a chest-beating anthem steeped in the sertanejo country music associated with Brazil's rural interior, the eldest son of former President Jair Bolsonaro offers himself as a champion of the heartland's conservative values.

The lyrics make seven mentions of "faith" and repeated calls to "hope" and "believe," appealing to a growing evangelical Christian electorate that voted heavily for Bolsonaro's father.

"These words captivate people," said Gilberto Musto, a campaign marketing consultant and author on electoral communications.

In the song's video, clips of the candidate wearing a cowboy hat and blowing a traditional horn used by cattle drivers help to play up the Rio lawyer's affinity with a booming farm country where agribusiness leaders show deep resistance to the current government.

Both sides are expected to release new jingles and videos as the campaigns progress.

MUSIC'S ENDURING ROLE

Musto said Lula's and Bolsonaro's songs are "the right choices for the moment," updating a storied tradition of Brazilian campaign jingles.

Campaign songs draw on a tradition of street vendors using music to attract customers and help reach voters in a country with low literacy rates historically, said Dr. Kjetil Klette Bohler, who studies the role of music in Brazilian politics at the University of South-Eastern Norway and is writing a book on the phenomenon.

Lula's first presidential run in 1989 featured a now classic jingle with the chorus of "Lula lá" that has made a reprise in each of the six presidential campaigns that would follow.

Bohler said Brazilian campaigns are also choosing musical genres increasingly as political signals, with sertanejo more closely associated with Bolsonaro's conservative movement while samba, funk and other Afro-Brazilian traditions are often embraced by the left.

Lula "could have chosen a Mozart opera," MC Bob Rum said. "Instead, he chose a funk track that demonstrates his closeness to the everyday — to the ordinary citizen from humble, marginal communities." REUTERS