Construção (song)

"Construção" (pronounced [kõstɾuˈsɐ̃w]; Portuguese for 'Construction') is a song by the Brazilian singer and composer Chico Buarque, recorded in 1971 for his album of the same name. In 2009, "Construção" was selected by the Brazilian edition of Rolling Stone as the greatest Brazilian song of all time.^[1] An instrumental version of the song was featured in the 2016 Summer Olympics opening ceremony in Rio de Janeiro.^[2]

"Construção" emerged during a period of political repression in Brazil under the military regime (1964–1985).^[3] In the early 1970s, the country experienced a period called the Brazilian Miracle, a phase of rapid economic growth accompanied by low inflation.^[4][5][1] This economic expansion, however, occurred amid widespread censorship, political persecution, imprisonment, torture, and exile of dissidents.^[6][7] Artists were frequently targeted by censors, and many works were suppressed.^[8]

Buarque himself went into self-imposed exile in Italy in 1969,^[6] returning the following year.^[1] Upon his return, his songwriting adopted a more explicitly political tone.^[9] "Construção" was written during this transitional period and has been described by multiple journalists as a turning point in his work,^[3][5][1] marking a shift from subtle criticism to what Alexandre Faria characterized as "protest without concession".^[5]

"Construção" consists of 41 dodecasyllabic lines, each ending with a proparoxytone.^[10][11] The use of proparoxytones, numbering twenty distinct examples, creates a recurring phonetic pattern.^[11] The song is divided into three sections: two of seventeen lines each and a final section of seven lines. The first two sections are almost identical, differing only in the last word of each verse, which is systematically replaced to alter meaning. The final section reorders these endings more freely.^[11][12]

"Construção" functions as a chronicle or epic poem, narrating, in an impersonal third-person voice,^[4][13] a day in the life of an urban construction worker from his departure from home to his fatal fall.^[3] The protagonist's death is portrayed as an inconvenience to public life rather than a tragedy.^[14] Charles A. Perrone has compared the piece to Buarque's earlier "Pedro Pedreiro",^[15] as well as to Vinicius de Moraes's poem "O Operário Em Construção" by Adilson Citelli, noting its comparatively pessimistic conclusion.^[16] The song's lyrics are seen as a strong critique of the alienation of the worker in a modern, urban capitalist society, reduced to a mechanical condition, especially intensified in the third stanza.^[17] The song's opening line, "Amou daquela vez como se fosse a última" ('He made love that time as if it were the last time'), serves as foreshadowing of the worker's tragic fate.^[16]

In the phrase "Ergueu no patamar quatro paredes sólidas/mágicas/flácidas" ('He built four solid/magic/flaccid walls on the balcony', the transformation of walls has been interpreted as reflecting the progressive dehumanization and eventual demise of the protagonist.^[3][18] The phrase "Tijolo com tijolo num desenho mágico/lógico" ('Brick after brick in a magical/logical design') is self-referential, describing the song's own structure.^[18] The lyrics make extensive use of what academics called acoplamento (coupling), a linguistic device in which parallel syntactic positions are filled with phonetically or semantically similar elements, producing strong internal cohesion and memorability. Examples include the repetition of the preterite perfect tense for verbs of motion, the semantic equivalence of location words such as "a rua", "construção", and "no patamar", and the phonetic similarity of the proparoxytone endings.^[19]

Buarque's vocal delivery, joined by MPB-4 in the chorus,^[3] follows melodic descensions that align with the proparoxytone endings. Pauses are used at points describing the worker's death, leaving only the voice before the arrangement resumes. The final section is performed without pauses, leading to a musical climax.^[20] The composition uses only two related chords.^[5] The arrangement, by Rogério Duprat,^[21] gradually adds instrumentation as the narrative progresses.^[3][20] The song opens with guitar, bass, and light percussion, later incorporating piano, wind instruments, and brass.^[22] Duprat employed these additions to create an urban soundscape.^[3] In recordings including the original 1971 release, the song transitions into three stanzas from "Deus Lhe Pague", also from the same album, presented as a response from the deceased worker.^[20]

The album and its title track have been interpreted as critical of the military regime and of the widespread censorship of the time.^[3][23] "Construção" has been described as a "painful testimony of the demeaning relations between capital and labor", addressing the precarious working conditions, low wages, long hours, and frequent accidents in Brazil's rapidly expanding civil construction sector.^[3][17] Through its depiction of the dehumanization and exploitation of the working class, the song indirectly criticized the political and economic system of the era.^[3][1]

Despite its critical content, "Construção" passed through censorship without cuts.^[3][1] According to later accounts, an informal request by the record label's lawyer for the song to be banned—intended to generate publicity—resulted in the opposite outcome, with censors approving its release out of spite.^[24] Following the album's release, Buarque came under increased surveillance from censorship authorities.^[3][1] In a 1973 interview, he characterized the work primarily as a formal experiment or "game with bricks", referring to its wordplay with proparoxytones, rather than as an explicit protest about workers' conditions. He acknowledged, however, that placing a human character at the center of this "word game" inevitably provoked an emotional response from listeners.^[3]

"Construção" was released in 1971 as the title track of Buarque's album of the same name. The album, produced by Roberto Menescal with arrangements by Magro and Rogério Duprat, was issued in LP format in 1971 and reissued on CD in 1988.^[23] The front cover of the 1971 album Construção features a centered photograph of Buarque against an ochre background, a variation of brown, presented in a simple, classic style. The minimalism of the cover has been interpreted as reflecting the album's portrayal of Brazil's disadvantaged society. The ochre tone, which evokes the color of clay, has been associated with the character and social role of the manual laborer depicted in the title track. The album's back cover visually reflects the song's structure by arranging the lyrics in three blocks that resemble stacked bricks, with the spaces between them representing "cement", reinforcing the "construction" metaphor.^[25]