Brazil's new it-town for Carnival 2024

12.02.2024 - 15:26 / bbc.com

The city of Belo Horizonte is little known outside Brazil. Despite being a state capital and Brazil's sixth-largest city, Beagá, as locals affectionately call it, doesn't have beautiful beaches or colonial architecture to help put it on the map. Until recently, the city didn't even participate in Brazil's much-anticipated carnival season.

However, Belo Horizonte's young Carnival has quickly become one of Brazil's most popular. This year's Carnival (officially from 27 Jan-18 Feb, with the festivities peaking from 9-14 Feb) will see a record number of 5.5 million people celebrating in the city's streets – a figure considerably larger than its resident population. Headline acts, including international superstar Anitta, are also making an appearance for the first time, confirming Beagá as Brazil's hot new Carnival destination. 

It would be difficult to overemphasise how important Carnival is in Brazil. The period of merrymaking leading up to Lent is celebrated in other countries, but nowhere else is it pursued with such enthusiasm as in Brazil. Carnival is also big business: in 2023 it contributed more than R$8,180m (about £1.3bn) to the Brazilian economy.

Rio de Janeiro has traditionally captured almost half of this business and attracted most of the international tourists; its Carnival is the world's largest and most extravagant. Coastal cities like Salvador and Recife also have a strong Carnival tradition, while more recently, Brazil's largest metropolis, São Paulo, has emerged as an important Carnival destination. 

But this year, Brazilians-in-the-know are heading to Belo Horizonte.

Built as a planned city 127 years ago, Belo Horizonte is the capital of Minas Gerais, a state famous for its culinary traditions and sugarcane spirits. The city itself is renowned for its bohemian culture and laid-back vibe, but Carnival is taken very seriously here – blocos, or street bands, start as early as 05:00, and continue on until the early evening. This year, the number of blocos held will surpass that of Rio, and its Carnival is expected to inject R$1bn (£160m) into the local economy.

"It is only in even more recent years that Beagá has emerged as a popular destination for Carnival goers," recalled Marina Pisa, organiser of the popular Pisa na Fulô bloco in Belo Horizonte. "People used to leave the city – it was deserted."

According to Pisa, Belo Horizonte did used to celebrate Carnival when the city was founded in the late 19th Century. But in the 1980s, the parades died out due to lack of funds and interest, and it was only in 2009 that Carnival here was "reborn".

Natalia Becattini, a musician in one of the city's blocos, says that this rebirth was a decidedly political moment. "It was a political process, a