The combination of technology and creativity is a formula that has been repeated many times throughout the history of Brazilian music. In the country’s periphery, synthesizers and electronic drums became the vehicle of transformation for distinct regional sounds across Brazil, such as baile funk/funk carioca and tecnobrega. For years relegated to that space, these genres are now gaining traction on the world stage, breaking barriers, redefining global electronic music, and challenging the conventional narratives of cultural influence.
If bossa nova and samba used to be Brazil’s musical equivalents of a postcard, now it’s funk. Created in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, funk is not only being discovered by global audiences but also increasingly appearing in music by mainstream artists as big as Beyoncé. It even made it to the Grammys stage when Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion performed a snippet of a funk version of “W.A.P.” made by Brazilian producer Pedro Sampaio in 2021. Kanye West and Little Simz are other names who have inserted Brazilian funk among the sounds they explore just in the last year — not to mention “older” examples, like Björk playing funk in her DJ sets, the worldwide success of MC Fioti’s “Bum bum tam tam” in 2017, and collaborations between Brazilian funk MCs with international artists like Tove Lo (“Are U Gonna Tell Her?” features MC Zaac amongst funk beats) and Drake (who gave his own spin to Kevin O Chris’ 150-bpm funk hit “Ela é do tipo”).
But no artist has projected Brazilian funk to the world as far and seriously as Anitta. Her latest album, Funk Generation, is an unapologetic celebration of funk carioca, even if its conception was tailored for foreign audiences. The album comes at a time when Brazilian funk has also captured the interest of Anitta’s friends in the reggaeton scene. Emilia collaborated with funk singer Ludmilla in “No se ve” and also with Anitta herself and Tiago PZK’s “Alegria,” both songs featuring funk beats. Last year, Maluma and Karol G collaborated with Dennis DJ and Kevin O Chris in a new remix of the funk track “Tá Ok.” Karol G even performed the remix at the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards, and, of course, it was the highlight of the two concerts that the Colombian singer played in Brazil in 2024.
Reggaeton artists tapping into Brazilian funk feels full circle to Anitta’s career. Exploring the similarities between the two genres was a starting point for the singer’s project to propel Brazilian funk to international stardom. But with Funk Generation, she’s fully embracing the funk beats, from its Miami bass-inspired roots to newer breeds like Brazilian phonk. The latter is a classic case of Brazilian funk’s place and influence in foreign electronic-based genres. Around the world, funk is finding a place in the electronic music scene. Inspired by Brazilian funk, Norwegian DJ Slowboy meshed it with phonk beats and produced “Brazilian Phonk Mano.” The song made waves in East Europe, where other Brazilian funk artists like Bibi Babydoll also found success and led many other DJs to join the movement. However, the idea that baile funk classifies as electronic music still faces resistance amongst scholars and the general public.
To Thiago de Souza, a classic music professor who got his PhD in Music with a thesis on Brazilian funk, the genre is electronic music, but he believes there are at least two reasons why people refuse to see it as such. “The first reason is social,” he tells us. “People tend to associate music genres with social groups. When it comes to electronic music, there’s an idea that it is music for white, middle-class European people. But funk is made mainly by Black people from marginalized regions.” The second reason, he notes, is that most sounds in electronic music are synthesized and made on a computer, and we can’t know with certainty which instrument they come from. “In funk, we hear the sounds of a flute, atabaque, berimbau, piano, etc. So it can be kind of confusing to people who have an idea of electronic music being made only of synthesizers.”
People tend to associate music genres with social groups. When it comes to electronic music, there’s an idea that it is music for white, middle-class European people. But funk is made mainly by Black people from marginalized regions.
The ability to encompass different sounds and styles is one of the reasons why Brazilian funk is crossing barriers and entering different markets and niches. Evidence lies in the works of Tropkillaz, the Brazilian duo formed by producers and DJs André Laudz e Zé Gonzales. Their unique combination of funk and hip-hop led them to collaborate with Major Lazer, Aloe Blacc, Marshmello, and Tokischa, just to name a few international artists. “We use elements of funk in a way that is not [meant exclusively] for Brazil, but for the world,” Gonzalez tells Remezcla.
Their work would take them even to the farthest places from Brazil, such as South Korea. Being one of the most relevant pop music industries in the world, K-pop’s recent embrace of Brazilian funk plays a big part in the genre’s projection. You can find Brazilian funk in K-pop as far as 2020, and its recent popularity can be credited in part to Tropkillaz. It’s a path Lauz and Gonzalez hadn’t imagined going through when they unpretentiously uploaded a few funk beat loops to the free music library SPLICE. These loops were later heard in songs and performances by K-pop artists like BLACKPINK’s Lisa, MAMAMOO’s Hwasa, and WOODZ. Fast forward to 2023, and Tropkillaz was producing original funk beats for TXT & Anitta’s “Back for More” and a funk version of aespa’s “Better Things.” They also note that K-pop icon G-DRAGON once tried clearing a funk beat from them, but the song was never released.
If Brazilian funk was a symbol of marginalized people from Rio de Janeiro, in the Amazon region of Brazil, tecnobrega was the people of Pará’s response to 1980s techno music and the economic crisis of the late ‘90s, musician and researcher Eduardo Barbosa notes in an interview for Remezcla. The genre also incorporates the drum patterns of rock’n’roll and the traditional sounds of the South American Amazon, evolving into a vibrant genre born in peripherical regions of Belém, the capital of the Brazilian State of Pará. The “aparelhagens” (sound system parties) in Pará played a crucial role in popularizing tecnobrega in Belém and its metropolitan region.
As Barbosa explains, tecnobrega combines futurism with traditionalism, and a genre that was once confined to aparelhagem parties is now captivating foreign audiences. We can go all the way back to 2012, when tecnobrega DJ Waldo Squash’s remix of Pet Shop Boys’ “Memory of the Future” was included in the British duo’s official remixes album. The duo would later explore tecnobrega again in their 2016 album Super, on“Twenty-something.” But nowadays, it is through the music of pop stars like Pabllo Vittar and DJs like Necropsycho and Miss Tacacá that tecnobrega is gaining worldwide recognition.
Although Vittar lived only a few years in Pará, the genre has hugely influenced her. Her tecnobrega-inspired songs have been performed at international festivals like Coachella and the Argentina and Chile editions of Lollapalooza. DJ Necropsycho took the tecnobrega hit “Mega Príncipe Negro” to his set at the Indian psytrance festival Cosmic Spirit in 2022. Tecnobrega DJ Miss Tacacá was featured in the U.K. electronic music project Boiler Room in 2023. This year, Miss Tacacá curated an exclusive set of Boiler Room events in Belém.
Funk and tecnobrega still face prejudice in their own country, the latter having the additional challenge of making itself known amongst Brazil’s Southeast-centric culture. And despite their electronic foundations, they are not exactly the genres that come to mind when we think of electronic music made in Brazil. Nevertheless, they’re at the forefront of Brazil’s rising position on the global music stage, carrying a rich DNA with them and echoing the voices of historically neglected groups in Brazil’s history, such as Black and Indigenous people.
