Arena Full of Fans Caught Brazilian Fever and Had to Sing Along

Brazil’s top pop singer, Ivete Sangalo, boldly courted a wider audience with a concert on Saturday night at Madison Square Garden. According to the promoters, Caco de Telha Entertainment, she was the first Brazilian musician to headline the Garden; the show was videotaped for her next live DVD. (She recorded a previous live DVD and CD, “Multishow ao Vivo: Ivete no Maracanã,” at a Rio de Janeiro soccer stadium, so the Garden was comparatively intimate, even on the weekend of New York’s Brazilian Day festival.)

Breaking news about the arts, coverage of live events, critical reviews, multimedia and more.

• Go to Arts Beat »

A sortable calendar of noteworthy cultural events in the New York region, selected by Times critics.

• Go to Event Listings »

Ms. Sangalo, who is from the state of Bahia, sang in English and Spanish along with Portuguese. She had guest duet partners including the Colombian rocker and Latin Grammy Award champion Juanes, the Portuguese-Canadian pop singer Nelly Furtado, the Brazilian songwriter Seu Jorge and the Argentine pop singer Diego Torres — and her husky voice could hold its own with them. She had fireworks and confetti, dancers and costumes, and a catwalk that got her closer to the audience. She was indefatigable onstage, doing fast samba footwork in high heels through a three-hour set. A new song, “Aceleraê” (“Acceleration”), promised to dance all night: “Today is the day of Ivete!” the lyrics proclaimed.
The Brazilians who sold out the 15,000 tickets — including 5,000 tickets sold in Brazil — roared through singalongs, and in “A Galera,” a song about dancing, the fans line-danced on cue, spilling into the bleacher aisles.
But it won’t be easy for Ms. Sangalo to expand her territory and join performers like Beyoncé, Madonna and Shakira as a globally recognized pop star. There is, inevitably, a language barrier for songs in Portuguese. Ms. Sangalo’s set included two awkward American oldies: “Human Nature” from Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” redone as a Bahian sambareggae, and the Commodores’ “Easy,” which she sang accompanying herself on piano. Her duet with Ms. Furtado, “Where It Begins,” was a lightweight but more promising pop fusion: an optimistic love song in English meshed with a Brazilian beat. She also reached for a Spanish-speaking audience; her duets with Juanes and Mr. Torres were bilingual love songs.
Ms. Sangalo has another hurdle: rhythm. Many of her Brazilian hits, like “Cadê Dalila,” use the fast, clattering beat of Bahian carnival music, axé — a beat that few outside Brazil can keep up with. It could be harder for international audiences to assimilate to than Beyoncé’s R&B or Shakira’s midtempo cumbia. She tried one international crossover strategy: putting synthesizers and a common-denominator 4/4 club beat under one medley of hits. But completely giving up that Brazilian propulsion would neutralize her music. It’s the crossover dilemma, and one that Ms. Sangalo still needs to work out.
Ms. Sangalo strutted through the routines of an arena diva with spirit. Yet after the confetti shower and the big exit — ascending with a bunch of balloons — she came back for another unchoreographed half-hour that was thoroughly Brazilian and the best part of the concert. She brought her whole staff onstage along with Margareth Menezes and Netinho, fellow Bahian singers. With her band somehow picking up cues amid the crowd, she vaulted through a half-dozen carnival songs, full of references to the streets and neighborhoods of Bahia’s capital, Salvador, with the whole arena singing along. Even in New York she was playing to a home crowd.
Afterward, when Ms. Sangalo and her troupe had left the stage, the audience started its own singalong, spontaneously. It was a song that celebrates soccer wins, “Eu Sou Brasileiro”: “I am Brazilian, with much pride, with much love.”
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: September 9, 2010

A music review on Monday about Ivete Sangalo, at Madison Square Garden, misstated a word in the name of the company that promoted the concert. It is Caco de Telha Entertainment, not “del.”