[Mestre Bimba]

Mestre (master) Bimba (Manuel dos Reis Machado) was born on November 23rd, 1900 at the Bairro do Engenho Velho in Salvador, Bahia and started capoeira at the age of 12. He was taught by Bentinho, an African who used to be a navigation captain. Mestre Bimba was a coalman, carpenter, warehouse man, longshoreman and horsecoach conductor, but mainly he was a capoeirista and a giant with a strong personality!

In spite of the national ban on practicing capoeira, Mestre Bimba created a new style, Capoeira Regional (as opposed to the traditional Capoeira Angola of Mestre Pastinha). He incorporated new moves and techniques from Batuque, a martial art that he learned from his father, the unified champion. Capoeira Regional or Luta Regional Baiana was a different, efficient style of capoeira. Mestre Bimba was finally successful in convincing the authorities of the cultural value of capoeira, thus ending the official ban in the 1930s.

Mestre Bimba founded the first capoeira school in 1932, the Academia-escola de Capoeira Regional, at the Engenho de Brotas in Salvador, Bahia. In 1937, he earned the state board of education certificate. In 1942, Mestre Bimba opened his second school at the Terreiro de Jesus (today rua Francisco Muniz Barreto, #1). The school is still open today and supervised by his former student, Vermelho-27. He also taught capoeira to the army and at the police academy.

Mestre Bimba died on February 15th, 1974 at the Hospital das Clinicas de Goiania, due to a stroke. Capoeira progressed from an illegal art to become a national sport in Brazil due to the efforts of Mestre Bimba and his supporters, and for that reason, some refer to him as “the father of capoeira.”

[Mestre Pastinha]

Vicente Ferreira Pastinha was born in 1889 in Salvador, Bahia. Pastinha was often beaten up by older boys, thus, an African named Benedito took him aside and taught him capoeira when he was only eight. From then on, Pastinha defeated his opponents and was admired by them.

Pastinha took art classes at the Liceu de Artes e Ofiio, where he learned to paint. In his free time he played with kites and trained capoeira with Benedito. Later, his father made him join a school to become a sailor. Although capoeira was illegal and not tolerated in the school, Pastinha taught it to many of his friends. At 21, he left school to become a professional painter.

When Mestre Bimba helped to get capoeira legalized through the creation of Capoeira Regional, many other capoeiristas, including Mestre Pastinha, felt that capoeira was losing more than it gained by being stuffed into presentable uniforms and being taught in strict sequences. The old way was simply to learn by doing and watching rodas. Improvisation and malicia were the trademarks of the original capoeira, which came to be known as Capoeira Angola.

In 1942, Mestre Pastinha opened the first Angola school, the Centro Esportivo de Capoeira Angola. Students wore black pants and yellow shirts after the colors of the Ypiranga Futebol Clube, Pastinha's favorite soccer team.

Mestre Pastinha said, “Capoeira é para homen, menino e mulher, só não aprende quem não quiser.” (Capoeira is for man, child and woman; the only ones who do not learn it are those who do not want to.) He also said, “O que eu faço brincando, você no faz nem zengado.” (What I do playing, you don't even do when you're mad.) Mestre Pastinha is the one who tells the story of carrying a double-edged sickle everywhere and fastening it to the end of a berimbau to turn the instrument into a weapon.

Because of his passion for art and his eloquent sayings, Mestre Pastinha became known as the philosopher of capoeira and because of his tireless teaching despite constant struggle with local authorities, he became known as the father of Capoeira Angola.

[Mestre Suassuna]

Reinaldo Ramos Suassuna, also known as Mestre Suassuna, started practicing capoeira in the early 1950s. When he started capoeira, he did not associate himself with a group, but rather, learned to love capoeira as a whole, independent of whether it was Angola or Regional.

He met people from the academies of Mestre Bimba and Mestre Pastinha and participated in presentations in Salvador with Canjiquinha, Gato, and Caicara. Mestre Suassuna met Brasilia in 1967, and together they founded the Associação de Capoeira Cordão de Ouro.

Today, Mestre Suassuna is proud to see that his group's work is well structured and full of creativity, with members all over the world. His many activities include various presentations, the recording of four compact discs, the directing of the performance group of Cordão de Ouro, the creation and development of the miudinho style of capoeira and the conducting of workshops and seminars in several states in Brazil and around the world.

[Mestre Virgulino]

Acclaimed musician and capoeira master Mestre Virgulino (Julio Souza) was born in 1972 and started training capoeira at the age of 7. In the 1990s, Mestre Virgulino started teaching in the renowned school of Cordão de Ouro.
He received the rank of a master in 2005 under the direction of Mestre Suassuna.
Mestre has many schools around the globe, led by talented teachers. Mestre Virgulino now teaches in Albuquerque, New Mexico.