rock, samba, soul or funk anymore. Samba rock turned into an original thing." Popularity and modernization Samba rock reached mainstream audiences in the late 1960s. It became more popular during the 1970s and 1980s, especially in discotheques. This gave more exposure to Ben, Trio Mocotó, and other acts from São Paulo's black music scene, although none of them declared themselves samba-rock artists. Ben's songs in particular became enduring favorites at traditional samba-rock parties. In subsequent years, samba rock developed from a dance phenomenon and music style into a complex cultural movement, involving musicians, producers, DJs, dancers, visual artists, and scholars. The parties eventually came to include big bands and hip hop, alongside samba music. In the early 2000s, the genre was refashioned in a more modernized form featuring electronic samples, departing from the traditional set-up of Ben and Trio Mocotó's 1970s music. This newer form was typified by the bands Sandália de Prata and Clube do Balanço, who first played middle-class areas of São Paulo. The new wave of artists deliberately created music that would suit samba-rock dances. In 2001, Universal Music Brasil capitalized on this resurgence of samba rock with the "Samba Soul" reissue series, re-releasing albums by Ben and other 1970s performers of the style. Ben, who still performed at this time, was recognized by Time Out as an "aging maestro" representative of the "favela samba rock" contingent in the contemporary MPB scene. Samba rock's modernization has seen its incorporation into dance academy curriculum, gym classes, party productions, dance collectives, and other events. Samba-rock dance forms of the past were revisited in the 2000s by black Brazilian and dance-club culture, as well as Brazilian hip hop groups such as Soul Sisters. Samba-rock culture has also faced debates surrounding gender equality. An advocacy project, "Samba Rock Mulheres" (), was created in response to the marginalization of women as supporting dancers to the predominantly male stars at dance events. In 2010, three figures associated with the samba-rock movement—dancer Jorge Yoshida, musician Marco Mattoli, and producer Nego Júnior—started a grassroots campaign to have samba rock registered as a cultural heritage of São Paulo. The campaign eventually attracted the participation of various artists, musical groups, producers, political leaders, and citizens of São Paulo. In November 2016, the Municipal Council of Historic, Cultural and Environmental Preservation of the City of Sao Paulo (CONPRESP) finally declared samba rock a cultural heritage of the municipality.