College Forró: the translation of northeastern "forró" in Brazilian southeast

Abstract

The aim of the present study is to explain the evolution of the dance College Forró and its origins. In order to do so, the pertinent literature was investigated. The origin of the name "Forró" has three versions. The more acquaintance one suggests that it comes from the English expression "for all" and the more scientifically based one suggests that it derived from the African expression "forrobodó", which means popular dance. At the beginning of the decade of 90’s, from the parties animated by the “forró pé-de-serra”, college students from Southern Brazil became interested in the rhythm, developing it and calling it CF. CF is the traditional “forró pé-de-serra” incremented by other rhythms and instruments besides the trio "zabumba", accordion and triangle. Thus, we can conclude that CF had its origins in the middles of the decades 1990 and 2000, and that it is basically constituted by the Baião, Xote, and, less frequently, Xaxado.