Uma flor para Chico

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“On this day in 1952, Brazil came to a stop.”

That was my fun fact of the day on Tuesday. I don’t know what sort of reaction I was expecting to get out of people, but when I told my rowing instructor as he was helping me into the boat, his face suddenly got very grave. I felt the need to offer up supplementary information. “On September 27th, 1952, Francisco Alves died in a car accident on the way back from São Paulo.” He was staring at me with a very serious expression. I was about to offer more details when he cut in. I thought he was going to reveal that he was a long-lost relative of Chico Alves’, or that he was Chico’s biggest fan. Instead, he put up a hand to shush me and said, almost in a whisper, “There is a bee on your shirt.” I shooed it away and he launched me off onto the Lagoa; we spoke no more about Chico Alves. But I had all of a blindingly sunny spring morning, rowing in little circles, to think about the events of September 27th, 1952. “Contristadora a notícia infausta tomou conta da cidade: morreu Francisco Alves!” bellowed A Manhã. “Chora o povo carioca -o povo de todo o Brasil,” wailed o Diário da Noite. On September 29th – this day in 1952 – the funeral procession stretched on as far as the eye could see, confounding journalists’ capacities at estimation. I could try to give a sense of the feeling of loss that wracked the country, but I think that O Dia does a better job than I ever could:

A cidade rendeu ao filho que lhe traduzia a extensão da sensibilidade e do lirismo romântico, o culto póstumo que ele merecia. Francisco Alves, sem dúvida, o cantor maior do canto popular nascido nestas plagas, o intérprete da poesia pura que brota das almas simples e se amplia em estrofes de sentido profundo. Da sua garganta privilegiada voaram as melodias mais lindas que se inventaram para exprimir as dores e as alegrias coletivas. E os discos que fixaram as harmonias do trovador magnífico permitiram o milagre dessa consagração comovente. O homem pereceu no tremendo desastre que lhe cortou o fio da vida, mas o seu espírito, a sua alma, ficaram na voz maravilhosa gravada pela radiofonia para a duração quase ilimitada. As homenagens que as emissoras prestaram ao cantor prodigioso deram a impressão de que dos frangalhos da sua carcaça se desprendiam os sons esplendidos e vibrantes que encheram os ares da metrópole e do país inteiro, como que afirmando a fragilidade da morte diante dos impetos do gênio. E Francisco Alves desceu ao túmulo no mesmo instante em que em todos os quadrantes da pátria se ouvia a sua voz sentimental e bem brasileira…” O Dia, 30 de setembro de 1952.

It’s been nearly 60 years, and for most people those wounds seem to have healed. But I found myself retracing the steps of the funeral procession and making my way back to São João Batista to see if anyone besides an American music researcher would come to remember o Rei da Voz. By the time I got off the bus in Botafogo, the sun was starting to sink behind Corcovado; and I realized with a similar sensation that I didn’t have any flowers for Chico. Luckily, one of the trees along R. Real Grandeza proffered a spring bloom; and I bought a palma vermelha from a very enterprising florist situated right outside the cemetery gates. Where is Chico Alves’ grave? I asked the first guy I saw sitting outside the main offices. He shrugged. “Ask that guy around the corner, he probably knows better.” I did as ordered. “Chico Alves?” he said, puzzled. “Francisco Alves,” corrected the woman sitting next to him. He scratched his head as an enormous black cat (are they obligatory mascots for cemeteries?) wound its way around my legs. “Head down there until you get to the cross,” he said finally, “and turn left. Keep going and it’ll be on your left, a black tomb with a bust of him on it.” The man’s knowledge of the cemetery was probably encyclopedic. I thanked him and headed off, trotting a bit to make it there before the sun’s rays died altogether. The honking and bustle of the street faded away almost immediately, and I found myself humming “Ora vejam só” to cut through the silence of the place. I passed Carmen’s grave on the way, where someone had pasted up a weathered photo of her. When I rounded the corner at the big cross, I saw that there was someone standing by Chico’s bust: a guy in a brightly patterned shirt, arms crossed and leaning against a neighboring tomb, looking as though he were waiting for someone. I made my way over and laid down the flowers on the black marble, next to the inscription from “O Silêncio do Cantor”. David Nasser, a confidant, biographer, and lyricist of Chico’s who wrote the song, claims that Chico asked him for “a song to be my epitaph.” And so it was.

Tu, só tu madeira fria Sentirás toda agonia Do silêncio do cantor.

As I laid the flowers down, the guy gave me an approving nod. We stood there in silence for a long moment, listening to the echoes of a stilled voice, until he caught my eye. “Do you know the story of Chico Alves’ death?” he said abruptly. I do, I’m researching Francisco Alves. This didn’t stop him from launching into it; I listened along as if it were a particularly gruesome bedtime story. Chico had just given a barn-burning show in São Paulo and was on his way back with a friend, Haroldo Alves (no relation). As legend would have it, Chico died because of América-RJ’s goalie. He and Haroldo were listening to the game on the radio, and when the Mecão’s goalie let one slip by him, Chico snapped off the radio in a fit of rage. Soon after that, Haroldo nodded off and woke up in the hospital. They’d collided with a truck (license plate number 11-58-84, R.G.S., O Dia reported). Haroldo flew from the car, but Chico was trapped in the Buick, which was engulfed in flames. His body “was taken from the wreckage almost unrecognizable, completely charred,” wrote O Jornal do Brasil tersely. Brazil had lost its first musical icon. “It was the biggest funeral in Rio’s history,” said my new companion earnestly. But I thought that Carmen Miranda’s was… “No, it wasn’t. Chico’s was bigger.” I decided to let it go. I took a few photos of the tomb – flowers scattered here and there, a lone candle – and he walked me out, reminiscing about Chico’s last concert. They were closing the cemetery gates behind us, and I felt a twinge at leaving Chico – so sublime in the recording studio, so irascible and eccentric in life – alone with his flowers and his mute guitar. But on the bus back home, I popped on my headphones, and there he was again.