Baile Charme in Madureira - The Foreign Exchange - Better
Charm, as we know, is a synonym for enchantment, an attribute for something attractive. If Rio wins over admirers from all over the world, part of that attraction is due to its sounds and its swing, to its natural musicality and its ginga. Charme, a popular dance style that emerged in Rio's suburbs in the 1980s, is a striking trait of that swing.
Charme dance party in Jardim Guadalupe, a suburb of Rio de Janeiro
To the sound of romantic soul and rhythm'n'blues songs, the attendees create collective choreographies, in which the ones who dictate the little steps, sometimes repeated by dozens of people, are the charmeiros, the more experienced dancers at the parties. The most famous charme dance party in the city is the one that has been taking place for more than 20 years under the Negrão de Lima viaduct, in Madureira, also known as Dutão.
They say the name "charme" was coined by DJ Corello, at the turn of the 1970s into the 1980s, in reference precisely to the "charming," slow, and elegant way of the improvised dances set to black music in Rio's suburbs. The name and the style caught on so much that, today, several other charme dance parties take place around the city, especially in the streets.
