Bira Almeida

Who is Bira Almeida?

Ubirajara Guimarães Almeida, better known as Mestre Acordeon is a native of Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, and a master of the Brazilian folk art known as Capoeira. His international reputation as a respected teacher, performer, musician, organizer, and author is built upon fifty years of active practice, as well as research into the origins, traditions, political connotations, and contemporary trends of Capoeira. Mestre Acordeon has travelled extensively promoting Capoeira outside Brazil.

Acordeon was a student of the legendary Mestre Bimba in the late 1950s and began teaching Capoeira in the early 1960s. He founded the Grupo Folclorico da Bahia in 1966 that performed the show Vem Camará: Histórias de Capoeira in the Teatro Jovem in Rio de Janeiro. The show presented an approach to Capoeira that influenced a new generation of young capoeiristas and affirmed the concept of grupo de Capoeira and today’s capoeira regional. He won three titles in capoeira national championships in the 1970s before coming to the United States towards the end of 1978. Acordeon introduced Capoeira on the West Coast in early 1979 and currently he maintains the United Capoeira Association with several associated schools. He also has created the Capoeira Arts Foundation in Berkeley, California which sponsors UCA and the Projeto Kirimurê, a social program for children in the neighborhood of Itapoã in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil.