Five weeks in Europe, after months of pandemic and isolation. Gilberto Gil started his European tour in Dijon on September 30, he will end it in Portugal on November 7 in Santarém (after Swiss dates canceled due to Covid-19). At his side, several members of his family, sons, grandchildren, as well as the singer Adriana Calcanhotto to ensure the first part of the concerts. On October 15, he set the Roubaix theater on fire as part of the Tourcoing Jazz Festival. He did it again on October 25 at the Philharmonie de Paris, raising the public in the last part of a show with an eclectic repertoire – chosen as a family – and marked by the limping return of one of his sons, forfeited on the first dates.
Since 2020, Gilberto Gil should have sang several times in France and presented a world premiere opera in Paris, but everything was canceled. For months, while far-right President Jair Bolsonaro downplayed the scale of the health crisis, it was the governors of different states who established containment measures at the local level. Protecting Brazilians have spent months locked in their homes. Many artists like Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso have kept in touch with their audiences on social media. Meanwhile, anger against Bolsonaro has grown in the country (the management of the Brazilian president was singled out by a parliamentary commission of inquiry on October 20). We wanted to know how the citizen, the man, the artist Gilberto Gil was doing, but also the patriarch of a very musical clan.
Franceinfo Culture: After many meetings canceled due to Covid, you have finally been able to come back to play in Europe. How are you doing ?
Gilberto Gil : I’m fine. We had to put up with the situation in Brazil, the isolation, the fear, all the problems posed by the pandemic. Finally, there was the vaccine which helped a lot. This made it possible to organize the trips, the tour outside of Brazil, all over Europe. The French government asked us to observe ten days of quarantine, we spent it in Dijon where the tour began. Then we programmed many concerts everywhere, Nantes, Cologne, Stockholm …
How did you experience the pandemic in Brazil, morally, psychologically?
Initially there was fear. And the anguish, the sadness, because there was death everywhere, in Europe especially, in Italy, in Spain, it was very difficult. I was following very closely the evolution of the situation, on the side of science, medicine, research. I was mostly in expectation, without losing hope. I was patient, I waited, I hoped. Afterwards, there was something of the order of getting used to this situation, to daily difficulties.
Did you ever feel angry with the president, the government and their handling of the health crisis?
Anger on a personal level, I didn’t feel it. Because I didn’t expect anything else from them. I already knew they were crazy. They don’t feel a deep interest in the Nation, in society … It’s difficult, words fail me.
In Brazil, did you feel that this crisis had changed attitudes towards the current executive and the president?
I hope so, because he was elected by a large part of Brazilian society. This large part has followed a global trend that is turning to the right. We can find something comparable in Europe, with certain parties … But after the deep disappointment felt, I believe, I hope, in general, that there has been a minimum of awareness, necessary, to look for something else, other political groups for a new government next year.
Can Jair Bolsonaro still win the presidential election in Brazil in 2022, according to you?
I hope he will lose. He lost much of his electoral support, of those who supported him. They have lost the hope they put in him and I hope that will be reflected in the vote. It’s not sure, but the possibility of a change is really big.
Do you today feel optimism, hope, even worry about the political situation in your country and its current image in the rest of the world?
Yes, I think a bit like that … I think that certain sectors of international politics in Europe, in America, have lost the hope they previously harbored with regard to Brazil, its future, the role that this country could play. We have lost a lot of the general enthusiasm that Brazil was arousing in the international community. At the same time, it’s not just Brazil. Seeing this type of crazy right in power, which promotes the idea of violence and conflict, is a general and recent problem that the planet is going through.
Is the youth of this country a source of hope?
It is a young, complex country, with a very original social construction in the sense of modernity, with this possibility of a future, of something different for humanity. A lot of hope was projected towards the Nation, the “brasilianité”. We lost a very important part of it.
On an environmental level, you know the concern the world has for the Amazon rainforest. In Brazil, are mentalities changing and mobilization progressing?
If we look at society in general, we can say that this is the case. in the majority of the population, and especially the middle class in large cities such as São Paulo, Rio, Salvador de Bahia, but also further north of Brazil, mentalities are in favor of more attention being devoted to ‘environment. I think that we have made progress in raising awareness and in the actions to be proposed, to be taken to improve the situation.
It has been well over half a century that you have been fighting for democracy, for political and cultural pluralism, for diversity, you have known exile … Isn’t it hopeless to have to constantly repeat these struggles?
No. It’s the good fight. He always deserves attention, dedication. And this attention, this dedication brings meaning, a form of accomplishment when we see that it pays off in a certain way. The efforts made provide a form of nourishment for hope. They give us the energy to move forward.
And as an artist, do you still have the same faith, the same desire, the same energy?
In the physical sense, it is not the same thing because age brings its share of changes in relation to health. Age brings a kind of weight. In the spiritual sense, of the soul, of the spirit, of the interior space, the youth is always there, by my side.
On a lighter note, one last question about this family tour: is it you who wanted your grandchildren to accompany you, or is it an idea, perhaps, of your granddaughter Flor, a budding singer? ?
It is a natural consequence of the life process. They were born in the midst of a family very attached to culture, music, discussion, values that go in the direction of an evolving vision of life. They grew up with music and they in turn engaged in this art.