From Five-Star Hotels to a São Paulo Square

Edson Café played guitar with the pagode group Raça Negra and was one of the people who helped form the band, one of the biggest names in Brazilian pagode. The TNH1 article describes him as a former member who later became a street dweller, and raises questions about why he was gradually pushed out of the group without answering them.

In 2016 the programme Repórter em Ação followed him for 60 days. It found that he had lived on the streets of São Paulo for about ten years. He admitted that his meals were irregular, saying that some days he had lunch but no dinner. He had left his family behind, and when asked about that he said that he had not abandoned his family but had abandoned himself.

A later report from 2020, which cites Câmera Record, places him in Rio de Janeiro and says he earned money as an informal car minder. It says that about ten years earlier he had a stroke that affected the movement of his arms, and that he began using drugs afterwards. He had lived with his children and attended rehabilitation clinics, without lasting results. He also said he resented former colleagues who refused to give him money, reportedly out of concern that he would spend it on drugs.

What changed his situation was a fan and friend, Xênia Alves. In 2016 she offered him a place in her home, and the 2016 article asks whether he will accept, whether his children will forgive him and what will happen when he meets two former bandmates.

In the 2020 report she is said to have taken him to São Paulo and to be helping him keep away from drugs. She describes him as her brother.