but worldwide, becoming the first Brazilian song to be played over a million times on American radio. Due to the huge popularity achieved in the United States, it received an English version by songwriter Bob Russell. It was voted by the Brazilian edition of Rolling Stone as the 12th greatest Brazilian song. Controversy This song, because of its exaltation of Brazil's great qualities, marked the creation of a new genre within samba, known as (exaltation samba). This musical movement, with its extremely patriotic nature, was seen by many as being favorable to the dictatorship of Getúlio Vargas, generating criticism towards Barroso and his work, which was perceived as Barroso's prostration to the regime. The Barroso family, however, strongly denies these claims, pointing out that he also wrote an anti-Nazi song named "Salada Mista" (Mixed salad), recorded by Carmen Miranda in October 1938. Vargas, although not a fascist himself, was as sympathetic to such regimes in the early years of his presidency as the European governments of the time. The Department of Press and Propaganda, the official censorship body of the regime, wanted to censor the verse "terra do samba e do pandeiro" ("land of samba and the pandeiro"), which was seen as being "derogatory" for Brazil's image. Barroso persuaded the censors to keep the line. Some criticism to the song, at the time, was that it used expressions little known by the general public, such as "inzoneiro", "merencória", and "trigueiro" (intriguing, melancholic, and swarthy), and that he was too redundant in the verses "meu Brasil brasileiro" ("my Brazilian Brazil") and "esse coqueiro que dá coco" ("this coconut palm that produces coconut"). The composer defended his work, saying that these expressions were poetic effects inseparable from the original composition. On the original recording, Alves sang "mulato risoneiro" (laughing mulatto) instead of "inzoneiro" because he was unable to understand Barroso's illegible handwriting. Lyrics The Portuguese lyrics are as sung by Francisco Alves (chorus in brackets). The S. K. Russel English version is from the sheet music by Southern Music Publishing Company. The tune of the first four lines of the introduction is the same as the first instrumental break in the Alves version. Notable recordings The song has received many successful recordings through the years, being played in many different genres, ranging from its original samba genre to disco. It is one of the 20 most recorded songs of all time. In