The dissonant lives of Brazilian Black women non-samba singers.

This essay derives from an oral history project on Brazilian Black women singers whose careers are not exclusively confined to samba and other musical genres usually identified with blackness in the Brazilian imaginary. The interviews challenge the widespread notion that Black musicians should concentrate on samba, and demonstrate features of the lifepaths and struggles shared by a number of successful women singers who succeeded, despite the obstacles they encountered, in creating a new field for themselves and for their artistic peers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]