MPB or musica popular brasileira emerged in Brazil in the mid-1970s, toward the end of the military dictatorship. As a genre it was immensely popular, but it has not received the critical attention in the U.S. given to its predecessors: samba, bossa nova, and tropicalia. Moehn, an ethnomusicologist and a musician himself, spent time in Rio, interviewing and playing with some of the top performers in the genre. The central chapters form portraits of these stars, while offering insights into their concern to balance Brazilian and foreign elements creatively in their music.

Brazilian popular music is widely celebrated for its inventive amalgams of styles and sounds. Cariocas, native residents of Rio de Janeiro, think of their city as particularly conducive to musical mixture, given its history as a hub of Brazilian media and culture. In Contemporary Carioca, the ethnomusicologist Frederick Moehn introduces a generation of Rio-based musicians who collaboratively have reinvigorated Brazilian genres, such as samba and maracatu, through juxtaposition with international influences, including rock, techno, and funk. Moehn highlights the creativity of individual artists, including Marcos Suzano, Lenine, Pedro Luís, Fernanda Abreu, and Paulinho Moska. He describes how these artists manage their careers, having reclaimed some control from record labels. Examining the specific meanings that their fusions have in the Carioca scene, he explains that musical mixture is not only intertwined with nationalist discourses of miscegenation, but also with the experience of being middle-class in a country confronting neoliberal models of globalization. At the same time, he illuminates the inseparability of race, gender, class, place, national identity, technology, and expressive practice in Carioca music and its making. Moehn offers vivid depictions of Rio musicians as they creatively combine and reconcile local realities with global trends and exigencies.

"“Contemporary Carioca is a solid scholarly text, and it’s a good read.”" - The Wire

"“[A] capable study, particularly useful for its consideration of the music of
Lenine, a major musical figure. For all libraries supporting study of popular music.”" - Notes

"“...Moehn’s work is important because it brings to the table fresh, interesting material that he analyzes with a nice combination of ethnomusicological and anthropological insights and frames. Present and future ‘new Brazilianists’ will do well to follow his lead by examining the multiple processes that go into making music and studying artists who, for one reason or another, have received little scholarly attention."" - The Americas

"“[An] insightful mix of anthropological ethnography and musical analysis. . . . Moehn expertly switches register throughout the chapters moving from a mode that privileges the contextual description of a historian / biographer to one of a music critic exercising a precision of vocabulary to catch the subtleties of musical meter and harmony to a register of high theory engaging Deleuze and the present zeitgeist of anthropological musings on identity-as-becoming in addition to Turino and current theories of musical semiotics as indicative of sociality. The fluidity of Moehn’s prose evinces a mastery of all registers, that which only a performer, in all of its connotations, could pull off.”" - Luso-Brazilian Review

"“With his vast knowledge of post-production studio technologies and his intimate knowledge of popular music in both political and commercial contexts, Moehn provides a valuable and highly engaging contribution to the field.”" - IASPM@Journal

"“Moehn’s study provides productive insights for novices and experts in Brazilian music studies. His descriptions of how artists are managing and even benefiting from the decline of the record industry are especially illuminating for researchers who are interested in the effects of neoliberalism on musical production in Brazil and beyond. . . . Moehn’s descriptions of each artist’s biography and analyses of their major works are thought provoking and present a much-needed English language resource for Brazilian pop music enthusiasts.” " - Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology

"“Throughout, Moehn’s book is gratifyingly rooted in the specifics of musical sound and production procedure. . . . It bursts with telling details. . . . The sophistication of Moehn’s take on the thorny subject of middle-class identity is worth mentioning as well. . . . [An] innovative and well-accomplished piece of popular musical analysis.”" - Ethnomusicology