Before “Pelo Telefone” (just the music) was registered in the Biblioteca Nacional, in 1916, by Ernesto Maria dos Santos (Donga) in the style of “samba”, at least two other sambas had been recorded. “Em casa de baiana” (Alfredo Carlos Brício, 1913) and “A viola está magoada” (Baiano, 1914). “Pelo Telefone”, however, had more success and fixed the name “samba” as one of the popular urban styles of Rio de Janeiro.

In reality, what was sung in the houses of the “tias baianas”, such as Ciata, were memories of Northeastern parties, interwoven with improvision, true ‘quilts’ of melodic patchwork. It was almost nothing like what today we consider to be samba.

The utterance that gave birth to the sung lyrics of Bahiano and set in wax at Casa Edison, in 1916, was in regards to the polemic law against gambling made by the chief of police Belizário Távora…