Felipe Maia

|GRAMMYs/Oct 7, 2024 – 09:02 am

Hip-hop in Brazil has always been women’s turf. From pioneers like Dina Di to mainstays such as Chris SNJ, Kmila CDD, and Negra Li, female rappers have never put the mic down since first grabbing it in the early 1990s.

Yet, despite the steady growth of Brazilian hip-hop in the last decade, women are often overlooked compared to their male counterparts — some of whom lack the skill but still enjoy the fruits of fame.

This dynamic is common in many countries, such as the U.S. and England. But, like Megan Thee Stallion and Ice Spice, Brazilian rappers are rewriting the game. In recent years, names like Ajuliacosta and Tasha & Tracie have made a mark on the country’s hip-hop scene; their solid releases fueled by sharp rhyming and performances loaded in artistry. These artists run a wide gamut of subgenres, exploring sounds as much as their lyrical horizons. Social issues, racism, sex, love, and anti-LGBTQ+phobia — there’s a lot in their lyrical arsenal.

Read more: A Timeline Of Brazilian Hip-Hop: From The Ruas To The Red Carpet

Read on for a selection of women in Brazil’s diverse hip-hop scene, a world that melds together baile funk and trap, southern beats and grime, traditional chants and fast bars. Continuing the tradition of resistance while reshaping the present and future of Brazilian hip-hop, these artists keep the mics and bars high.

Ajuliacosta

Hailing from Mogi das Cruzes, in the outskirts of São Paulo, Ajuliacosta is amongst the most relevant names of Brazilian hip-hop today. Her laidback flow and sharp pen are a statement against a rap scene used to praising ordinary speed-flow and pointless braggadocio. 

AJC has performed at several festivals since her debut, 2023’s Brutas Amam, Choram e Sentem Raiva. On that record, Julia moves swiftly through her personas: the loving demoiselle, the saddened girlfriend and the merciless OG. All of that is filtered by the perspective of an independent Black woman from a favela whose flow slides on bars and reiterates words to make them stronger. Self-titled a chavosa (stylish) majesty, she sings in “Queen Chavosa”: “The hussle, it’s us. The support, it’s us. The sponsor, it’s us.” 

Anna Suav

Suav is a stylized writing of “suave,” the Brazilian Portuguese word for “smooth.” Indeed, Anna Suav’s voice can be quite soothing, with words that caress the listeners’ ears through her R&B-laced hip-hop. But Anna can also play the warrior, a fierce bar-spitter who proudly shouts out her region, the Amazon rainforest.

On “Dengosa & Brabona” — a Jersey bounce joint released in last June featuring brega funk (a variant of baile funk) MC Rayssa Dias — Anna transforms the rapid beats into a soulful bed for her warm vocals. In “Levante,” alongside fellow Northern rapper Bruna BG, she declares: “From where we come, there will be more.” 

Indeed, over the past decades, artists hailing from the Amazon region have been claiming more space and recognition in the South-centered Brazilian music industry. Female hip-hop artists like Anna Suav, Bruna BG, Nic Dias and Nega Ysah are leading the front. 

Áurea Semiséria

Born and raised in Salvador, Bahia, Áurea is one the most versatile contenders on the rise. Her concise, but purposeful catalog showcases an artist unafraid to bend rap according to her taste. Where spitting rhymes over the modern, percussion-laden strain of samba known as pagodão or going all-out on grime beats, Áurea wastes no bar. “My flag is black, my voice is a shotgun,” she fires in her performance in the YouTube channel Brasil Grime Show.

With the mic in hand, she not only claims a space for her own music but also for Bahia’s hip-hop scene. The state, home to Brazil’s largest Black population, has birthed several prominent rap acts, including Opanijé, Afrogueto, and Vandall.

Bione

Whether acting, writing, performing on theater stages, or improvising in an Instagram video, Bione embodies the versatility and sharpness of rap. A remarkable alumna from Slam das Minas PE — one of Brazil’s most influential poetry slams — Bione is a multifaceted talent who explores hip-hop through various forms. 

Born and raised in Pernambuco, a northeastern state celebrated for its cultural richness from literature to music and carnaval, Bione first arrived on the scene in 2019. On her 2022 debut album, Ego, Bione collaborated with Mãe Beth de Oxum, a pillar of local Black traditions, and fresh voices from brega funk. On the track “Deixa as Garota Brincar,” she boldly declares, “[The male rappers] tried to make me afraid of them, but now they’re afraid of me.”

Duquesa

Duquesa, which translates to “duchess,” is the title young Jeysa Ribeiro chose for herself when she set out to claim her spot among Brazilian rap royalty. She is certainly living up to the name: In just a few years, the rapper from Bahia has risen from an impromptu first performance at a book release event to becoming one of the most recognizable names in Brazilian hip-hop. Her success is underscored by her nomination for Best New International Artist at the BET Awards 2024.

Whether spitting bars over a fast-paced drill beat or gliding smoothly over an R&B groove, Duquesa embraces both the blessing and the responsibility of her growing reputation: “I don’t have time (…) I’m worried about getting rich this year, everybody’s asking me about my next release,” she sings in “Turma da Duq” (“Duq’s Crew”). Her career is guided by the legendary Mano Brown, leader of the iconic Brazilian hip-hop group Racionais MCs, a weighty association she handles with ease — her talent speaks for itself.

Ebony

Showing off an impressive style of grandiloquent bars and melodic, yet corrosive prosody, Ebony is a name that should not be forgotten. She has released two albums in the past three years, Visão Periférica (2021) and Terapia (2023) and has remained a significant presence in the hip-hop conversation. Whether through her clever pen in singles and features with up-and-coming names such as Urias and Carlos do Complexo or her talent for engaging in fiery debates within Brazilian hip-hop, she has stayed relevant.

One such debate she ignited herself in late 2023 with “Espero Que Entendam.” The track is a powerful diss aimed at the top-tier male rappers in Brazil, and produced in collaboration with producer Larinhx, and their male-dominated hegemony: “I told them I have bars/if I start to spit them, they will be shocked,” she rhymes.

Slipmami

Showing off a Slipknot t-shirt on her TikTok account, flaring neon-colored laces on a music video, and keeping her fancy nails always sharp, Slipmami won’t go unnoticed. And clothing is just a piece of the puzzle she brings to the table. The Rio de Janeiro rapper is a blend that only hip-hop could create: a cross-pollination of anime characters and precise, lascivious lines.

Her 2023 debut album, Malvatrem, is a fierce statement from a girl who knows what she wants — both in bed and in the streets. She rhymes over finger-snapping beats, dirty South jams, baile funk drums, and grim chords. Whether on tight tempos or loose trap vibes, Slipmami spares no bars and no one.

Tasha & Tracie

Brazilians of Nigerian descent, twin siblings Tasha and Tracie have been stirring up  Brazilian street culture for a couple of years. They first emerged into the hip-hop world in the mid-2010s as bloggers who praised Brazilian favela sartorial style as much more than a trend — it was a lifestyle. They were right, and in 2021 they brought their life experiences to music with their debut, Diretoria.

The album sent shockwaves through Brazil’s hip-hop scene, showcasing a duo that could deliver abrasive lines and mellow double entendres, straightforward jabs, and clever wordplay. Since then, the sisters have kept their pen and mic busy via features and collaborations, such as the gritty “Drop da Santa”—a nod to São Paulo favela kids who wear Santander/Ferrari garments exclusively.

This multiyear project brings together scholars, artists and students from Duke, North Carolina Central University (NCCU) and the Federal Rural University in Rio de Janeiro to investigate key forms of activism and cultural organizing that reaches Black and poor youth in urban Brazil. In 2023-2024, the team focused on exploring and inventorying the educational techniques developed by Instituto Enraizados to encourage defense of rights and active citizenship. 

In August of 2023, several members of the team traveled to Rio de Janeiro to meet Black female politicians and participated in a Black Women’s March as well as work closely with local partners at the Instituto Enraizados and the Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro. The team produced two films about the visit that have since been shown in classrooms and events.

During the academic year, the team learned the historical and methodological foundations of community organizing oriented around hip hop in contemporary Brazil and collaborated on a range of outputs, including:

1. Public-facing events such as a panel during a week of activities celebrating 50 years of hip hop
2. Two conference presentations
3. The translation of an article by one of the team’s Brazilian collaborators
4. A ten-day visit by Dudu de Morro Agudo, the founder of Enraizados and creator of the RapLab methodology

During the visit, Dudu and team members presented at a conference in Asheville, North Carolina, met with local rappers in Durham and spent two days with Montu Miller on the Hip Hop Scene in Athens, Georgia to visit a high school and an ambitious training center for youth, and participate in a monthly open mike event with 120 participants.

The team also worked closely with Dr. Kisha Daniels from the Program in Education to support Duke students who learned the RapLab methodology and implemented it at a public Durham middle school. Dudu joined the students on two successive Fridays, the second to record their songs. One team member produced a short documentary about the collaboration.

In June and August of 2024, team members will travel to Brazil again to begin the next phase of collaborative work, including widening the research focus to include activism and culture in the Baixada Fluminense that relates to and extends beyond the hip hop pedagogies that were considered in this project.

São Paulo, October 2, 2024 – Netflix announces today the special guests participating in Rhythm and Flow: Brazil, its first Brazilian musical reality show. The lineup features prominent names from the rap scene, which is growing in the country, celebrating established artists and creating opportunities for newcomers.

The show will include 20 artists from the Brazilian scene: Azzy, Bob13, Dallas, Dexter, Ebony, FBC, Iza Sabino, Jottapê, Karol Conká, KL JAY, Laudz, Marcelo D2, Maru2D, MC Luanna, Negra Li, N.I.N.A, Sidoka, Vulgo FK, WIU and Zegon. Each will support the artistic growth of the new crop of rap and trap artists taking part in the competition. 

Rhythm and Flow: Brazil is the Brazilian version of the US show Rhythm & Flow. With an authentic, documentary style, the reality show will follow the artistic growth of the participants throughout the competition and will crown a rising star on the Brazilian rap and trap scene. The winner will receive R$ 500,000 to launch their career as well as a spot on Season 5 of Sintonia. 

Serving as judges are Djonga, from Belo Horizonte; Filipe Ret, from Rio de Janeiro; and sisters Tasha & Tracie, from São Paulo. Following the same format as the US, French and Italian versions, the reality show is shot in the three judges’ hometowns, with a focus on the places that impacted their careers — Viaduto Santa Tereza (in Belo Horizonte), Tavares Bastos and Lapa (in Rio de Janeiro) and Cidade Tiradentes (in São Paulo). Rapper and songwriter Kamau hosts, with beats by the fierce DJ Miya B.

Rhythm and Flow: Brazil is an Endemol Shine Brasil production, directed by Cacá Marcondes and co-directed by Fábio Ock and Maristela Mattos.

About Netflix 

Netflix is one of the world’s leading entertainment services, with 278 million paid memberships in over 190 countries enjoying TV series, films and games across a wide variety of genres and languages. Members can play, pause and resume watching as much as they want, anytime, anywhere, and can change their plans at any time. 

About Endemol Shine Brasil

Endemol Shine Brasil is a division of Banijay, the world’s largest producer and distributor of independent content. Endemol Shine Brasil creates and produces reality, scripted, and documentary content for all platforms. Its catalog includes both domestic and global hits it has produced and distributed, such as MasterChef, The Masked Singer, Canta Comigo, Rolling Kitchen, Love is Blind, The Bridge Brazil, Queen Stars Brazil, Big Brother Brazil, No Limite, Xuxa – A Life on TV, and more. It also produces branded content for all platforms, for brands such as Cabelo Pantene, Ilhados com Beats, Onix Music Trip, TeleKwai, and more. With more than 300 licensed products and digital initiatives, Endemol Shine Brasil also specializes in brand licensing, creating dynamic multi-platform strategies and content for brands and channels.

Just to give you an idea, Spotify announced in 2023 that Brazil was its 3rd largest market for hip-hop streams1, a genre accounting for almost a quarter of the platform’s total. And in Brazil, where every major city and every region has its own musical style, urban music is no longer limited to hip-hop alone: trap is mixed with pisadinha, baile funk, inherited from Miami Bass, comes in an infinite variety of forms, and R&B flirts with Musica Popular Brasileira… 

To help you discover the incredible depth of Brazilian urban culture, here’s a selection of some of its most representative new artists, with whom Believe has the pleasure of working.  As always, turn the volume up, it’s going to be tudo bem!

CRYZIN 

Just over a year ago, Cryzin burst onto the Brazilian scene with ‘Mais Existe Um Lugar’. Going viral in just a few days on social networks, the track, mixing trap and R&B, in duet with Kaio Viana, quickly climbed into the Brazilian Top 50 and into all the local rankings of streaming services. A year later, the video has over 30 million views and the remix just as many; while the original and sped-up versions have racked up over 64 million listens on Spotify.

Since that first hit, Cryzin hasn’t really rested, having released over a dozen singles, remixes and collaborations in 2023. And the Salvador native already has several tracks to his credit since the start of the year: ‘Adrenalina’, ‘Meu Primeiro Milhão’ (which also has its own remix and sped-up version) and ‘Sexta Hoje & Aonde’, a very soaring trap sound released last April. These tracks were co-composed with his regular producer Noémie Leal, since in addition to singing, Cryzin can also handle the keyboard and guitar. And by the way, Meu Primeiro Milhão also happens to be the title of his recently released first album. 

With that work ethic, there’s absolutely no doubt that Cryzin will continue to surprise the Brazilian scene in the months to come.

GREGO 

Although he grew up surrounded by sertaneja music, it was rap that launched Grego‘s career. In early 2023, Grego released “Pagou Pra Ver”, his first single in a very modern trap style. He went viral on Brazilian social networks singing an extract from his 4th single “Indomável“, a trap track with a minimalist electro beat.  But it was piseiro that brought Grego luck.

Extremely popular in north-east Brazil, where Grego is from, piseiro is a music genre that borrows from other very Brazilian styles such as forró and baile funk, and features synthesizers and drum machines. After releasing several hip-hop songs, Grego surprised everyone in October 2023 with ‘Pane No Sistema‘, a piseiro track that became an instant classic, quickly entering the top 10 most listened-to tracks in Brazil on Spotify, and racking up millions of views on YouTube (81 million at time of writing). Grego ended 2023 with a debut album, also called Pane No Sistema, featuring other Piseiro hits such as ‘Bricando com Fogo’ and ‘Então Vai’.

At the beginning of March 2024, Grego did it again with ‘Goteiras‘, a new rap track with a baile funk rhythm. There’s no doubt that Grego is at ease in every genre and is sure to surprise us again this year!

DJ MATT-D

DJ Matt-D is what you might call a precocious artist, having produced his first tracks as early as 2013, only aged 14 years old. He trained hard on his own, experimenting with different musical genres. By 2016, he was sharing online his own productions and remixes in genres ranging from electronic music to trap and baile funk.

It’s thanks to this trap-funk fusion that he became popular. In 2020, he released ‘Homenagem aos Relíquias‘, a trap-funk prod featuring several singers from the new generation of funk who pay homage to the genre’s classics. The track went viral in a matter of days, ranking among the 50 most listened-to tracks on YouTube Music in 2020. And definitively revealed him as a producer. Since then, DJ Matt-D has never stopped producing for himself or other artists on the funk scene.

On Spotify, where he has over 4 million monthly listeners, several of his tracks exceed tens of millions of streams, including ‘Tipo Gringa‘ and ‘Peças de Griffe’ with Menor MC. ‘Pandora‘ and ‘Novidade na Área’ even go past 180 million. Among his tracks released in 2024, ‘Acendo o Beck’ and ‘Cena de Filme‘ have already passed the million stream mark. And who knows, he might well become one of the decade’s most emblematic producers!

OS GAROTIN 

All hailing from São Gonçalo, the young members of Os Garotin are already seasoned musicians. They met in 2019 and regularly played together alongside their solo careers. It wasn’t until 2023 that Os Garotin became a reality, when Paula Lavigne, companion of the legendary Caetano Veloso, convinced the artists, who had been attending open workshops at the home of the maestro of Brazilian music, to form a trio.

They soon released Os Garotin Sessions, a first EP recorded live, mixing samba, bossa, R&B, soul and funk (not baile funk this time). An immediate success! Not only do the tracks ‘Queda Livre’ and ‘Zero a Cem’ top the million marks in YouTube views and Spotify streams, but the EP is nominated for awards such as the Prêmio Multishow 2023 (TV Globo) and wins the Prêmio Potências (Billboard). October saw the arrival of Só vem, a second EP in the same spirit.

2024 got off to a flying start with the success of ‘Nossa Resenha‘, an MPB-tinged single featuring their godfather Caetano Veloso, which is also featured on their 3rd EP Mais Una Historia de Amor released in February. Early May, AntchieX, Cupertino and Leo Guima released their debut album OS GAROTIN DE SÃO GONÇALO and they will get it on the road soon!

G.A 

Although he’s seen as one of the promising new artists on the Brazilian rap and R&B scene, the name of G.A name has been circulating in Brazilian hip-hop circles since as early as 2016. And when he released his first single ‘Missaõ‘ in 2020, G.A already had a small amount of notoriety acquired thanks to his multiple participations in Batalha da Aldeia and Batalha do Vila, rap battles filmed in public and broadcast on YouTube.

The Itapevi native already had a wealth of experience before launching his recording career. His audience grew as his singles were released, but two of them were very successful: firstly, ‘Contagem‘ in 2022, a trap and R&B track; then ‘Paladar Infantil‘ in 2023, another trap and R&B track, whose video clip climbed to 10 million views on YouTube.

This late March 2024, G.A released his debut album Sua Vez de Escutar, still exploring that trap/R&B mix and inviting some big names from the local scene like Menor MC and Vulgo FK. The album passed the 5 million Stream mark in less than 2 weeks on Spotify, and reached number 66 in the Brazilian Top 200 album chart on Spotify. An already successful year for G.A!

MARQUINHO NO BEAT

Even if he has managed to rack up no less than 5 million monthly listeners on Spotify, mainly because he has produced tracks for many of Brazil’s hottest hip-hop artists, Marquinho no Beat is a rather discreet person about whom very little is actually known.

Quite astonishing when you consider that several of Marquinho’s tracks exceed 100 million listens on Spotify alone. And that he has several diamond certificated songs. For instance, he is behind Contradições, the latest Kayblack’s EP, one of the most listened-to projects on Spotify in Brazil in 2023. He also produced the track ‘Larga Essa Vida‘ by MC Luanna, selected for Spotify’s “Best Of RADAR 2023” global playlist. In 2023, Marquinho No Beat released the album Intenção, a musical calling card on which he invites loyal collaborators and stars of the scene: KayBlack, CJota, MC Menor and many others.

Marquinho No Beat has been very productive in 2024’s first months: in addition to the Você Sabe album with emerging rapper Jamal KMG, he has released no less than six singles. Released at the end of March, the trap track ‘Arquivos’ with Azzy and Cave reached 120K views in less than a month. He’s well on his way to dazzling us for the rest of the year!