CTI returns to Vila Ré with free shows: a new work dives into the Cowboy Mass ritual and invites the audience to dance and share regional flavors.
Brazilian popular-culture research reference CTI – Teatro-Baile invites audiences to witness the making of its new piece, “Teatro-Baile tells the Cowboy Mass – in process,” a stage investigation inspired by the Cowboy Mass (Missa do Vaqueiro). The ritual was created in 1970 in Serrita, in Brazil’s Northeast, and the season also marks the reopening of the company’s historic headquarters in Vila Ré, São Paulo’s East Zone, with free performances from January 22 to February 1.
Rather than presenting a “finished” play, CTI opens its rehearsal room to the public: scenes still evolving, live music, and an experience designed to blur the line between stage and audience. Viewers are invited to move around, dance, and join moments of togetherness that include typical foods and drinks such as paçoca, kariri with honey, and cachaça with honey and lime.
The ritual born from justice and memory
The Cowboy Mass began as a tribute to Raimundo Jacó, a cowboy murdered in the 1950s in Serrita (PE). A cousin of legendary musician Luiz Gonzaga, Jacó became a symbol of justice and rural resistance across the sertão.
Twenty years after Jacó’s death, Father João Câncio conceived the celebration and invited Gonzagão, alongside artists and poets such as Pedro Bandeira and Janduhy Finizola. Over time, the ceremony developed its own liturgy, weaving together spirituality, popular culture, and countryside life — and it spread to several Northeastern cities, always held on the third Sunday of July.
From Serrita fieldwork to a shared performance
Supported by São Paulo’s Municipal Theater Funding Program (Programa Municipal de Fomento ao Teatro), CTI traveled to Serrita for research, gathering human, symbolic, and sensory material. That lived experience now becomes collective dramaturgy, with all members on stage and the audience treated as part of the event.
“We don’t want to tell Raimundo Jacó’s story, but to look at the people who keep this celebration alive: shopkeepers, cowboys, local workers — the people who build everyday life in the sertão,” says Beto Bellinati.
Live music blends Luiz Gonzaga classics with original compositions inspired by Northeastern rhythms. Onstage, accordion, zabumba drum, triangle, tambourine, bass, and assorted percussion drive the performance, while the visual design features cardboard masks resembling ox heads — a powerful symbol in the region’s imagery.
Beyond the artistic inquiry, the work signals a homecoming. “This piece also marks the return of our headquarters as a place for meeting, creating, and sharing with the public,” Bellinati adds. The project is part of “Theater Is a People’s Struggle – CTI 21 years (r)existing through identity,” selected by the 44th edition of the Municipal Theater Funding Program for São Paulo.
Synopsis
The performance investigates the “Cowboy Mass” from Serrita, Pernambuco, created in honor of Raimundo Jacó, considered the most important cowboy on record. A first cousin of Luiz Gonzaga, Jacó’s name has been sung deep in the Caatinga every third Sunday of July since 1970 — a cry for justice in the sertão for Raimundo Jacó, the “enchanted” cowboy. “Only remembered by the dog that still cries his pain.”
Service
Teatro-Baile tells the Cowboy Mass – in process
Dates: January 22 to February 1
Schedule: Thu, Fri, Sat at 8:00 pm | Sun at 6:00 pm
Venue: CTI Teatro-Baile Headquarters – Rua Pangauá, 381 – Vila Ré (São Paulo, Brazil)
Tickets: Free – pick up 1 hour before showtime
Capacity: 35 seats
Running time: 60 minutes
Age rating: All ages
Important: In case of rain, the performance will be canceled
Photo: Débora Peccin
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