Origins
The Samba is a Brazilian folk dance. It was popular in the northern part of Brazil. The samba was brought to Rio De Janeiro by the Africans who came down at carnival time. About 1917 the ballroom version was born. The word "samba" comes from Angola, where the Kimbundu term "semba" refers to the umbigada navel-touching "invitation to dance" that was originally part of many African circle dances.

The dance was introduced to the United States, to movie viewers in 1933 when Fred Astaire and Dolores Del Rio danced the samba in the movie Flying Down to Rio.  Years later Carmen Miranda danced the samba in That Night in Rio. Interest in samba came during the 1939 Worlds Fair in New York, where samba music was played at the Brazilian Pavilion. After the exposure of the samba in the world fair, it was included in plays and musicals on Broadway and in the Theaters.