Wilson Simonal

Though a seminal force in the development of Brazilian popular music, singer Wilson Simonal remains largely unknown outside of South America. The architect of the pilantragem sound that dominated Brazilian charts during the late '60s, he was the nation's first Black pop superstar, but his career never recovered from accusations that he was a police informant. According to Greg Casseus' exhaustive The Saga of Wilson Simonal (published in the spring 2004 edition of Wax Poetics magazine), he was born Wilson Simonal De Castro in the Rio de Janeiro suburb of Agua Santa on February ...