Tulane University
- A.b. Freedman School Of Business
- Administrator
- Affiliated Faculty
- Africa
- African Diaspora
- Africana Studies
- Afro Latinos
- Afro-caribbean Religion
- Afro-cuban
- Altman Program In International Studies & Business
- Amazon
- Ambassador Visit
- Center For Conflict And Cohesion Studies
- Center For Global Development
- Center For Global Education
- Center For Inter-american Policy And Research
- Central America
- Central American Policy
- Centro De Investigación Y Adiestramiento Político Administrativo
- Cepal
- Ceq
- Ceq Working Paper Series
- Chair In Economics
- Chavez
- Cipr
- Cipr And Iad Joint Seminar Series
- Cipr Post-doctoral Fellowship
- Ciprstaff
- Citizen Security
- City
- Colonialism
- Commitment To Equity
- Committee On World Food Security
- Communication
- Communications
- Community
- Cuban & Caribbean Studies
- Cuban-american Relations
- Cultural Rights
- Culture
- Culture And Community
- David Smilde
- Debt Crisis
- Declining Inequality
- Declining Inequality In Latin America
- Decompression
- Democrac
- Democracy
- Diplomat
- Disaster Relief
- Disaster Resilience Leadership Academy
- Discrimination
- Disposable Income
- Diversity
- Indigenous Latin American Languages
- Indigenous Rights
- Indirect Taxes
- Inequality
- Inflation
- Informal Urban Land Development
- Informal Urban Settlement
- Institutions
- Inter-american Court
- Inter-american Dialogue
- Inter-american Relations
- International Programs
- International Relations
- International Studies
- Intra-regional Trade
- Job Annoucement
- Job Announcement
- Job Opening
- Job Opportunity
- Journalism
- Judiciary
- K-12 Cuba Teacher Institute
- K-12 Teacher Workshop
- Kellogg Institute
- Music
- Natural Resources
- Neoliberal Policies
- Neoliberalism
- New Orleans
- New Orleans Center For The Gulf South
- Police Violence
- Policy
- Political Competition
- Political Economy
- Political Institutions
- Political Science
- Political Sociology
- Politicians
- Politics
- Politics Of Migration
- Popular Sector Incorporation
- Populism
- School Of Liberal Arts
- School Of Public Health & Tropical Medicine
- School Of Public Health And Tropical Medicine
- School Of Social Work
- Semester Abroad
- Sergio Bejar
- Speakers
- Staff
- State-society Relations
- Stone Center For Latin American Studies
- Student Funding
- Study Abroad
- (83) Politics
- (59) General Latin America
- (58) Venezuela
- (49) Political Science
- (47) Human Development
- (45) Commitment To Equity
- (24) Ceq Working Paper Series
- (21) Central America
- (21) Social Policy
- (19) Elections
- (17) Sociology
- (17) Costa Rica
- (17) Chile
- (16) Fiscal Policy
- (16) Political Economy
- (14) Latin American Legislative
- (14) Center For Inter-american Policy And Research
- (13) Future Of Cuba
- (9) Research
- (9) Stone Center For Latin American Studies
- (9) Ceq
- (8) Socialism
- (8) Cipr And Iad Joint Seminar Series
- (8) Anthropology
- (7) Fiscal Incidence
- (7) Core Faculty
- (7) International Relations
- (7) Environment
- (7) Literature
- (7) Income Redistribution
- (6) Spanish & Portuguese
- (6) Uruguay
- (6) Cuban & Caribbean Studies
- (6) Puerto Rico
- (6) Study Abroad
- (6) School Of Liberal Arts
- (6) New Wave
- (5) Declining Inequality
- (5) Cipr Post-doctoral Fellowship
- (5) Taxes
- (5) Southern Cone
- (5) Ciapa
- (5) Global Development
- (5) History
- (5) Policy
- (5) Social Justice
- (4) Center For Global Development
- (4) Redistribution
- (4) Undergraduate Students
- (4) Social Inclusion
- (4) Haiti
- (4) Dominican Republic
- (4) Populism
- (4) Guatemala
- (4) Ambassador Visit
- (4) Politics Of Migration
- (4) Hurricane Maria
- (4) Latin American Library
- (4) Imf
- (4) Econoimcs
- (4) China
- (3) Us-mexico Border
- (3) Tulane University
- (3) Education
- (3) Culture And Community
- (3) Neoliberalism
- (3) Declining Inequality In Latin America
- (3) A.b. Freedman School Of Business
- (3) Wacno
- (3) Globalization
- (3) Cooperative
- (3) Developing Democracies
- (3) Tulane
- (3) Cash Transfers
- (3) Voter Behavior
- (3) Extractivism
- (3) Labor
- (3) Environmental Studies
- (3) Violence
- (3) Graduate Conference
- (3) Inter-american Court
- (3) Coronavirus
- (2) Undergraduate Conference
- (2) Tucla
- (2) Social Equity
- (2) School Of Social Work
- (2) Social Inequalities
- (2) Migration
- (2) Tuscla
- (2) Reforms
- (2) Language
- (2) Comparative Politics
- (2) El Salvador
- (2) World Bank
- (2) Language And Culture
- (2) Public Policy
- (2) Police Violence
- (2) Ethno-racial Divide
- (2) Reading Project
- (2) Social Work
- (2) Award
- (2) Doctoral Program
- (2) Afro-caribbean Religion
- (2) Natural Resources
- (2) Oecd
- (2) Administrator
- (2) Job Announcement
- (2) Nora Lustig
- (2) Critical Race Theory
- (2) Public Opinion
- (2) Publications
- (2) Indigenous
- (2) Immigrants
- (2) Sergio Bejar
- (2) Mobility
- (2) Taxes And Transfers
- (2) Student Funding
- (2) Art
- (2) Nicaragua
- (2) Government Action
- (1) Central American Policy
- (1) K-12 Teacher Workshop
- (1) K-12 Cuba Teacher Institute
- (1) David Smilde
- (1) Graduate Students
- (1) Prison
- (1) Hurricane Katrina
- (1) Deportation
- (1) Study In Latin America
- (1) Government
- (1) Protests
- (1) Oil
- (1) Refugees
- (1) Social Mobilization
- (1) Social Justic
- (1) International Programs
- (1) Fundraising
- (1) Water Management
- (1) Forced Migration
- (1) Sustainability
- (1) Urban Ethnography
- (1) Lgbt
- (1) Kellogg Institute
- (1) Public Health
- (1) School Of Public Health And Tropical Medicine
- (1) Undergraduate
- (1) Diversity
- (1) Revolution
- (1) Tulaso
- (1) Greenleaf Fellow
- (1) New Orleans Center For The Gulf South
- (1) Latin Americanist Graduate Association
- (1) Lago
- (1) Lago Conference
- (1) Urbanism
- (1) Greenleaf Fellows
- (1) Slavery
- (1) International Studies
- (1) Outreach
- (1) Ethnography
- (1) Sustainable Development Goals
- (1) Catholic Church
- (1) Teacher Workshop; Outreach
- (1) French
- (1) Architecture
- (1) Indigenous Latin American Languages
- (1) Non-profit
- (1) Outrearch
- (1) Social Conflict
- (1) Audubon Zoo
- (1) Postcolonial Studies
- (1) Art History
- (1) African Diaspora
- (1) Middle American Research Institute
- (1) Job Opening
- (1) Center For Global Education
- (1) Relief
- (1) Disaster Resilience Leadership Academy
- (1) Trauma Institute
- (1) Cuban & Caribbean S
- (1) Mari
- (1) Authoritarianism
- (1) Gran Fiesta
- (1) Portuguese
- (1) Altman Program In International Studies & Business
- (1) Flas
- (1) New Orleans Film Festival
- (1) Democrac
- (1) Maduro
- (1) Elites
- (1) Africana Studies
- (1) Photography
- (1) Communications
- (1) Amazon
- (1) Identity
- (1) Graduate Student Conference
- (1) Community
- (1) Culture
- (1) City
- (1) Visiting Researcher
- (1) New York Times
- (1) Afro Latinos
- (1) Migrant
- (1) Migrant Workers
- (1) Peacekeeping
- (1) Paris
- (1) Hlpe Report
- (1) Venezuel
- (1) School Of Public Health & Tropical Medicine
- (1) Institutions
- (1) Rule Of Law
- (1) Benefit Incidence
- (1) Income
- (1) Hlpe
- (1) Urban Land Development
- (1) High Level Panel Of Experts
- (1) Nutrition
- (1) Committee On World Food Security
- (1) Food Security
- (1) Regional Agreements
- (1) Intra-regional Trade
- (1) Regionalism
- (1) Environmental Governance
- (1) Governance
- (1) Same Sex Marriage
- (1) Civil Society
- (1) Legislature
- (1) Transnational Activism
- (1) Effectiveness
- (1) Representation
- (1) State-society Relations
- (1) Informal Urban Land Development
- (1) Pension Reform
- (1) Forestry
- (1) Informal Urban Settlement
- (1) Legislatures
- (1) Transnational Law
- (1) Assembly Movements
- (1) Lasa 2010
- (1) Christian Science Monitor
- (1) Model Oas
- (1) Global Poverty
- (1) Global Economics
- (1) Roundtable
- (1) Meeting
- (1) Centro De Investigación Y Adiestramiento Político Administrativo
- (1) Political Competition
- (1) Celebracion Latina
- (1) Payson
- (1) Latino
- (1) Happiness
- (1) Debt Crisis
- (1) Film Series
- (1) Indigenous Rights
- (1) Ludovico Feoli
- (1) Fundación Vidanta
- (1) Buenos Aires
- (1) Teaching
- (1) Samuel P Huntington
- (1) Citizen Security
- (1) Prisons
- (1) Drug Trafficking
- (1) Anthony Pereira
- (1) Decompression
- (1) Inclusive Growth
- (1) Economic Forum
- (1) Fundación Rap
- (1) Transfers
- (1) Bolsa Familia
- (1) Mesoamerican
- (1) Poverty Reduction
- (1) Popular Sector Incorporation
- (1) Indirect Taxes
- (1) Semester Abroad
- (1) Fall
- (1) Music
- (1) Working Papers
- (1) Incidence Analysis
- (1) Repal
- (1) Public Sector
- (1) Inter-american Dialogue
- (1) Center For Conflict And Cohesion Studies
- (1) Social Dialogue
- (1) United Nations
- (1) Social Safeguards
- (1) Environmental Safguards
- (1) Private Sector
- (1) Spain
Tulane Professor Christopher Dunn Sets Background for Acclaimed Brazilian Musician Tom Zé's Latest Album Release
October 25th, 2010
By: Shearon Roberts
Photo: Tom Zé
Legendary inventive Brazilian artist Tom Zé has got the music review world talking about his recently released vinyl record box set showcasing Zé‘s three decades of music. The record label that first signed Zé twenty years ago, David Byrne‘s Luaka Bop, recently released the limited edition ‘Studies of Tom Zé.‘ It includes three albums, a live recording of Tom Zé and the Chicago-based group Tortoise, interviews with Zé and Byrne, and a special vinyl-sized 12-page liner notes booklet to the albums that captures the essence of the artist. Those liner notes were written by Tulane Associate Professor Christopher Dunn.
During October, media coverage hailed the one-of-a-kind keepsake, from Newsweek, to NPR‘s ‘Weekend All Things Considered,‘ to PRI‘s ‘The World.‘ The compilation will be reviewed my dozens more music sites next month and it will also be featured in the holiday gift guide of The New York Times in December. It was a natural project that found Dunn, who has written extensively on Zé, and the Brazilian Tropicália counterculture movement prominent in the late 1960s, of which Zé was a key figure.
‘I’ve known Tom Zé for almost twenty years,‘ said Dunn. ‘I was one of those people who were deeply inspired by ‘The Best of Tom Zé‘ compilation produced by Luaka Bop.‘
In the past 10 years, Dunn worked directly with Zé to research his 2001 book on the Tropicália movement, and on subsequent essays. The relationship developed where Dunn was asked to translate Zé‘s song lyrics in the past. For ‘Studies of Tom Zé,‘ Luaka Bop executive producer Yale Evelev, called on Dunn to write the liner notes.
The three-album compilation on vinyl is a significant release by label Luaka Bop, which revived Zé‘s career, re-launching him to an international audience, Dunn said. Zé‘s music was popular mostly in Brazil in the late 60s as he infused Brazilian pop music with stylistic elements of the U.S. and British pop/rock scene at the time. Over the next 20 years, the artist surpassed his initial creations, becoming more experimental, leading to a Rolling Stone magazine dubbing him the ‘Father of Invention.‘
‘At 75, when most artists of his generation are either retired or resting on their laurels, Tom Zé continues to come up with new, often startlingly fresh ideas,‘ Dunn said.
His initial musical innovations left him marginalized in the 70s and 80s, Dunn points out, but the 1990 release of ‘The Best of Tom Zé‘ revitalized his original musical creations in the 70s, of which tracks from his 1973 album ‘Todos os Olhos‘ and 1975‘s ‘Estudando o Samba‘ are included on the first album of the 2010 box set. The other two albums on the box set contain Zé‘s more recent work. ‘Estudando o Pagode,‘ (2005) and ‘Estudando a Bossa,‘ (2008) the other two albums on the box set, are Zé‘s interpretations on ‘pagode,‘ a form of popular samba, and on bossa nova, a musical movement in the 1950s in Brazil. Zé‘s inventive musical qualities are evident in ‘Estudando o Pagode,‘ for instance, Dunn said, where he sets the ‘pagode‘ ‘to a kind of samba opera about the emotionally fraught history of male-female relations.‘
In Dunn‘s liner notes, he articulates Zé‘s performance style of a mixture of pop music show conventions, and ‘free-wheeling improvisation with frequent interruptions, impromptu monologues, the occasional diatribe, and audience sing-alongs.‘
At a Tom Zé show, Dunn writes in the liner notes, one is taken through an experience that ‘is part musical performance, part stand-up comedy, and part lecture on a range of topics from the history of counterpoint to the pitfalls of globalization.‘ He calls his music ‘imprensa cantada, or sung journalism,‘ the title of a recent recording, Dunn wrote.
More of Christopher Dunn‘s liner notes for the limited edition ‘Studies of Tom Zé,‘ can be found at http://luakabop.com/tom_ze/box_set/
Related + People
Christopher Dunn

Copyright © 2021 Roger Thayer Stone Center For Latin American Studies All Rights Reserved.
Tulane University, 100 Jones Hall, New Orleans, LA 70118 (504) 865-5164 rtsclas@tulane.edu