October 5, 2020
Facebook Live
Presented as part of Music+Film: Brazil
Co-presented by Cinema Tropical, Brasil Summerfest, and the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies at NYU.
Directors Béco Dranoff and Guto Barra, in conversation with scholar Christopher Dunn, talk about their popular award-winning documentary film Beyond Ipanema: Brazilian Waves in Global Music, released in 2009 and focused on the international reach of Brazilian music from Carmen Miranda to today. The film premiered at MoMA’s Premiere Brazil Film Festival and screened in over 50 international festivals including SXSW, HotDocs, Chicago Film Festival and Rio Film Festival to critical acclaim. In 2012, Dranoff and Barra partnered with arts cable channel Canal Brasil (GloboSat) to produce a two season TV series based on the documentary, which has been sub-licensed to Brazilian channels Arte and Curta.
Béco Dranoff is a New York-based multi-faceted independent music, culture and entertainment creative producer and consultant active in the origination and production of international entertainment projects and social initiatives. Career credits include Grammy and Oscar nominated projects, as well as label founder, A&R, record producer, music supervisor, documentarian and TV series creator, festival curator, online radio host, branded content developer and DJ. In 1994 Dranoff joins forces with NY’s Red Hot Organization, the acclaimed pro-social production company, to co-produce the groundbreaking HIV/AIDS benefit compilations Red Hot + Rio (Verve/universal, 1996), Red Hot + Latin (Hola Recordings, 1998) and Onda Sonora: Red Hot + Lisbon (Movieplay, 1998) for Lisbon’s Expo ‘98. He is the co-founder of the music imprint Ziriguiboom Discos that signed and launched the international careers of artists Bebel Gilberto, Suba, Celso Fonseca, Zuco 103, Bossacucanova, DJ Dolores, Trio Mocotó, Apollo Nove and Cibelle. He was part of the curatorial team of New York’s Brasil Summerfest, transforming the festival into the most important Brazilian music event abroad. Live event curatorial work includes: Lisbon’s Expo ’98 Red Hot + Lisbon live, Red Hot + Rio live at BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music, 2008) and the Brazilian Summer Series at MOMA’s Sculpture Garden (2010, 2011). Dranoff continues to consult for artists, labels, brands and events, always aiming to create and produce music and cultural properties with broad global appeal and social scope.
Guto Barra is a New York-based Brazilian filmmaker and television director, founder of Producing Partners. He is the co-creator of numerous hit series on Brazilian television, for HBO, Food Network, GNT, Mulstishow and others. His directing credits include over 300 episodes of television series on travel, music, arts, technology and pop culture. His films have been shown in prestigious venues such as the Museum of Modern Art, in New York, Haus der Kulturen der Werld, in Berlin, and the Musee d’Art Moderne della Ville de Paris. Guto’s award-winning feature documentary Beyond Ipanema inspired a television series on Canal Brasil, shot in Asia, Europe and the United States.
Christopher Dunn is Professor and Chair of the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Tulane University. He is the author of Brutality Garden: Tropicália and the Emergence of a Brazilian Counterculture (2001) and Contracultura: Alternative Arts and Social Transformation in Authoritarian Brazil (2016), both published by the University of North Carolian Press. He is co-editor with Charles Perrone of Brazilian Popular Music and Globalization (Routledge, 2001) and co-editor with Idelber Avelar of Brazilian Popular Music and Citizenship (Duke UP, 2011).
