Chico Science

Francisco de Assis França (March 13, 1966 – February 2, 1997), better known as Chico Science, was a Brazilian singer and composer and one of the founders of the manguebeat cultural movement. He died in a car accident in 1997 in Recife, Pernambuco, at the age of 30.

Biography

Francisco de Assis França was born in the Rio Doce neighbourhood of Olinda, Pernambuco, in Brazil's Northeast Region. As a little boy he would sell crabs that he caught himself in the city's mangrove swamps.

He became the lead singer and major creative driving force of the groundbreaking Mangue Bit band called Chico Science & Nação Zumbi (CSNZ). Influenced by such musicians as James Brown, Grandmaster Flash and Kurtis Blow, their music cleverly fused rock, funk, and hip hop with maracatu and other traditional rhythms of Brazil's Northeast. World music critics found his music "original and distinctive of his region." Chico had a powerful stage presence that was compared by some to that of Jimi Hendrix.

Around 1991, Chico Science, along with singer Fred 04 of the band Mundo Livre S/A, founded the Mangue Bit cultural movement in response to dire economic and cultural stagnation in Recife and Olinda. CSNZ made their US debut at New York's Central Park Summerstage in 1995, opening for Gilberto Gil, with whom he collaborated during the encore. While in NY, they also performed additional shows at CBGB's, SOB's and at Bryant Park as part of the JVC Jazz Festival, on a bill with the Ohio Players.