Parintins Folklore Festival
Parintins Folklore Festival, or the Parintins Festival is a popular annual celebration during three days in late June held in the Brazilian city of Parintins, Amazonas. It is one of the largest annual festivals in Brazil; only the Carnival festivities in Rio de Janeiro and Salvador draw more participants. The festival is recognized as a Cultural Heritage of Brazil by the National Institute of Historic and Artistic Heritage.
The festival celebrates the Bumba Meu Boi, a legend about a resurrected ox. It is also a competition where two groups that perform this play, the Boi Garantido and Boi Caprichoso, compete in extended retellings of the story, each team attempting to outdo the other with flamboyant dances, singing, and parade floats. Each team has to complete its show within two and a half hours. A team that does not follow this time limit is subjected to points penalties. Each nightly performance is largely based on local Amazonian folklore and indigenous culture, but also incorporates contemporary Brazilian rhythms and themes.
The place where the teams present themselves is the Parintins Cultural Center, known as "Bumbódromo", a round, grounded stage. The "Bumbódromo" supports 35.000 people in the audience.
Despite the importance of the celebration to the Amazonas region of Brazil, this festival was not widely known in other parts of the country until the musical group Carrapicho released the hit Tic Tic Tac - Bate forte o tambor in 1996. The Parintins Folklore Festival was also responsible for the release of other songs that became known in Brazil, such as Vermelho and Parintins Para o Mundo Ver, among others.
It is common for local people to tell the visitors that Parintins is the only place in the World where Coca-Cola ads are blue. While it is true that within the Bumbódromo there are Coca-Cola ads in both red and blue, there are other instances of Coca-Cola ads reflecting the colors of sporting teams. During the 2011 Festival do Boi-Bumbá, Coca-Cola was available throughout Amazonas region in special edition cans that were half red, half blue.
History
In Parintins, groups that performed the Bumba Meu Boi piece dates back to the early 20th century, although at the time they were much smaller and less structured groups, and did not have any formal records. Before the festival, the Garantido and Caprichoso bois were already having a certain rivalry with each other. However, there were already other bois, preceding or contemporary to these two, such as Diamantino, Ramalhete, Fita Verde, Corre-Campo, Mina de Ouro, Galante and Campineiro.The first Parintins Folklore Festival took place in 1965, when a group of young people linked to the Catholic Church decided to hold the festival to raise funds for the construction of the Cathedral of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, the patron saint of Parintins. Although this year only quadrilhas performed and the bois were not the main attraction, the following year the groups were invited to participate in the festival, and for the first time both participated in the festival together. At that time, the criterion established to define the champion was the boi that received the most applause from those present. From then on, the rivalry between the Garantido and Caprichoso bois intensified.
Over time, the festival gained national relevance, being commercialized and "carnivalized". The groups became structured folklore associations and the event began to be broadcast nationally, by Rede Bandeirantes between 2008 and 2012, and since 2014 by TV A Crítica. The bois also perform at Carnaboi, a carnival held in Parintins.