Experience the Brazilian city of Salvador wherever you are right now. If your music collection includes Paul Simon’s 1990 album The Rhythm of the Saints, find it. If not, try a music streaming site. The song you need is “The Obvious Child.” Press “play,” turn it up, close your eyes.

Listen to that opening volley of percussion. You can practically hear the architecture of Pelourinho Square, where the performance was captured live. The exhilarating beat ricochets off the cobblestones and echoes against Portuguese colonial buildings.

Perhaps you recognize something else in the cascading rhythms: something cultural, something geographic. The sound of Africa.

The Pelourinho (affectionately known as Pelô) is Salvador’s oldest district. It was here, atop a cliff overlooking the sheltered expanse of Baía de Todos os Santos (Bay of All Saints) that pioneering Portuguese settlers established the first capital of Brazil in 1549.

For the basis of their economy on this tropical shore so far from Europe, they opted for sugarcane. For a workforce, they imported slaves from Africa.

Today’s Pelourinho Square, a sloping sliver of cobbled space at the heart of Pelô, is defined by the city’s early history. The pastel-painted buildings would not be out of place in Lisbon. From where we stand, in the shade cast by the Church of Our Lady of the Rosary, we can see three other centuries-old Catholic churches up on the hill ahead of us, rising from a jostle of red-tiled roofs.

Yet for all the European pretentions, most of the people mingling in the square are clearly of African descent. The souvenir shops sell African drums in a variety of sizes. At the top of the square, a green and white national flag hangs proudly from the wrought iron balcony of the Nigeria Cultural House.

Most Brazilian cities are a three-way blend of European, African and indigenous South American ingredients. Up in the Amazon, the indigenous flavors tend to predominate. Farther south, the European element prevails. But here in Salvador, 80 percent of the 3.5 million population has African ancestry, making this the largest African city outside Africa.

Some of the African cultural currents swirling through modern Salvador are easily apparent to visitors. When the drummers of Olodum — the group that provided the rhythmic backing not only for Paul Simon’s “The Obvious Child” but also for Michael Jackson’s “They Don’t Care About Us ” — stage impromptu rehearsals in Pelô, they thump out a primal pulse that reaches across the Atlantic to their ancestral continent.

That same beat underpins another distinctive legacy of Africa witnessed in Salvador’s public places. You’ll often see young men engaged in what looks like a slow-motion fight. With incredible agility, they flail their legs at one another, spin on their heels, turn cartwheels and throw graceful punches that always miss by a hair’s breadth.

This is capoeira, an indigenous martial art evolved in the 16th century from the dances of the African slaves. Although some variations of capoeira involve actual fighting, in Salvador’s street version agility is prized above aggression. As the drums pound and enthusiastic spectators lend their voices to a repetitive chant, the two contestants try to outdo each other with increasingly complex moves. The overall effect is hypnotic.

Africa also permeates the cuisine. Favorite ingredients include palm oil, cassava, coconut milk, cashew nuts, lime juice and dried shrimp, employed in different combinations to produce powerfully tasty dishes. Bahian cuisine, as it is known, is popular throughout Brazil, but Salvador remains its heartland, attracting foodies from across the country.

Of all the African currents, the most important is also the least visible to outsiders. It flows beneath the surface, silently influencing all aspects of daily life: Candomblé.

Candomblé is a unique blend of Catholicism and African tribal beliefs and is the dominant spiritual force in the city. As recently as the 1960s, it was illegal, and even official acceptance has not entirely brought it out into the open. From time to time you will sense strange goings-on in darkened corners of the Catholic churches, or you will hear drums and haunting incantations emanating from houses.

In the district of Bonfim, occupying a peninsula that juts out into the Bay of All Saints to the north of downtown, superstition and organized religion coexist in surprising ways. The city’s most famous church, Nosso Senhor do Bonfim, provides the focal point.

Ribbons tied as ex-votos in front of Nosso Senhor do Bonfim church © Jibmeyer | Dreamstime.com

As we approach the entrance from a sleepy, tree-shaded square, there are already hints this is not a typical place of Catholic worship. Thousands of tiny, colored ribbons adorn the building’s perimeter fence, fluttering densely in the salty breeze gusting up the surrounding streets from the bay. Someone praying for a miracle has tied each ribbon to the railings. According to legend, when the ribbon disintegrates, the miracle will be granted.

Does it work? Supplicants will direct you to the Room of Miracles inside the church, where full-sized wax representations of body parts dangle from the ceiling. There are legs, arms, heads, hearts and even male appendages. Each replica supposedly represents a realized miracle.

During the many years of persecution, Candomblé survived in plain sight in churches such as this. Ostensibly, the people congregated every Sunday to worship the Catholic saints, but secretly they linked each of those saints to a Candomblé deity. This particular church is dedicated to the supreme deity, Oxala.

Purer forms of Candomblé worship take place in shrines known as terreiros. Once completely out of bounds to outsiders, these shrines now cautiously admit small numbers of tourists. Witnessing a ceremony is an unforgettable experience.

It’s best to employ a local tour guide to steer you safely through the neighborhoods in which the terreiros are located, as well as to interpret the mystifying rituals. Out of respect, you should wear pale or white clothes, and you must resist the temptation to join in when everyone starts dancing to the beat of the ubiquitous drums.

Elsewhere, at all other times, dancing is actively encouraged in this city. Salvador is widely recognized as the party capital of Brazil, which is quite an achievement given how much Brazilians like to party. Don’t expect glitzy nightclubs. Here, the revelry often takes place spontaneously, out in the streets.

Salvador’s biggest party — in fact, probably the biggest street party in the world — is the annual Carnival, which for six days and nights transforms the city into a riotous throng of noise and color. Huge trucks stacked with banks of speakers blaring rhythmic music trundle at glacial pace along predetermined routes, accompanied by around 2 million revelers. (In 2014, the Carnival will run from Feb. 27 to March 5).

Although things can get pretty wild during the Carnival, the city has tamed down considerably from its early years, when it became a byword for debauchery. During the 17th century, the Bay of All Saints gained an informal epithet, “e de quase todos os pecados” — “and nearly all the sins.”

In the Lower City, fringed now by a forest of yacht masts in the marina, there are echoes of that colorful past. Crumbling, mildewed townhouses and warehouses still stand among the less characterful new buildings of the commercial district, providing some sense of the port’s history of trade, prostitution and slavery.

Standing down here, with the sheltered waters of the bay glimmering behind us, we face the physical obstacle that confronted the early inhabitants of Salvador: the sheer cliff that divides the Lower City from Upper City. Until the 19th century, all imports had to be manually hauled up and down the cliff.

A funicular railway (Plano Inclinado do Pilar) relieved some of the burden, and then, in 1873, the Lacerda Elevator was constructed to whisk pedestrians and cargo between the city’s two levels. Both are still in operation today. The elevator costs approximately a dime for a one-way trip.

We shuffle into the elevator with a crowd of locals for the 20-second ascent back to Pelô and spill out into a paved square at the top of the cliff. Ornate colonial buildings provide immediate evidence of why this historic district has been awarded UNESCO World Heritage status. However, as we wander among the labyrinthine streets, we have to remind ourselves that Pelourinho actually translates as “whipping post,” for it was up here that the early slaves were publicly lashed if they were judged to have stepped out of line.

In Pelô, we constantly oscillate between the African and European strands of Salvador’s history. The magnificent churches provide a vivid illustration of the great wealth the Europeans were able to extract from their Brazilian colony. The most spectacular manifestation is in the Church of São Francisco, where almost every inch of the interior is decorated with gold leaf.

Gold interior of the Church of São Francisco © Fábio Salles | Dreamstime.com

By stark contrast, the Museu Afro-Brasileiro, housed in a former 19th-century medical school, displays many of the simple carved artifacts produced by the African slaves, along with tribal weapons and the early representations of the gods of Candomblé.

Salvador’s national influence began to wane when its position as capital of Brazil was usurped by Rio de Janeiro in 1763 (which, in turn, ceded the honor to Brasilia in 1960). With the prohibition of slavery and the decline of the sugarcane industry, the city went into a long downward spiral.

That decline reversed in the second half of the 20th century, during which time Salvador’s population experienced a tenfold increase and the city became the third-largest in Brazil. New suburbs expanded along the Atlantic coast and inland. A new, ultramodern financial district sprang up around Avenida Tancredo Neves.

Unfortunately, this rapid growth outstripped the city’s infrastructure. Salvador’s rush hours are notorious and are a major cause for concern as the city prepares for its role as a host venue for the FIFA World Cup in 2014 and the Olympic Games in 2016.

To tackle some of the problems, a brand-new metro system is currently under construction, including a line that will link the airport to downtown. The first section of the downtown metro began operating in 2012. When additional stations open in 2014, the system is expected to carry 300,000 passengers each day.

For the inhabitants of Salvador, there is an easy escape from the stresses of urban life. The city boasts some of Brazil’s most popular beaches, with broad swathes of golden sand lapped by warm ocean waves. On weekends, it seems as if the entire city relocates to the coast to kick back.

After a day of soaking up the rays, many people gravitate to Forte de Santo Antonio, a combination of fort and lighthouse at the entrance to the Bay of All Saints, to watch the sun go down. They’ve been coming here for 500 years.

Surely the early inhabitants would cast a wistful gaze toward the Atlantic horizon, thinking of their distant homelands in Portugal or Africa. But this evening, everyone faces west, looking out across the Bay of All Saints. A fishing boat chugs into the bay, heading home.

Where to Stay in Salvador

Hotel Casa do Amarelindo This excellent boutique option in Pelourinho has just 10 guestrooms and a pool. Located in the pedestrianized zone, you’ll need to walk a couple of blocks on arrival. Rua das Portas do Carmo 6 $$$

Mercure Salvador Boulevard Enjoy great views from the upper rooms of this brand-new high-rise located in the financial district. The historic district and the beaches are within easy reach by taxi. Rua Eweron Visco 160 $$$

Pestana Convento do Carmo Formerly a convent built in 1586, this sympathetically restored 79-room property is the most luxurious option in the historic Pelourinho district. Rua do Carmo 1 $$$

Restaurants in Salvador

Amado Restaurante Looking out from the waterside onto the Bay of All Saints, Amado’s architecture and cuisine are boldly contemporary. Ideal venue for business or special occasions. Av. Lafayete Coutinho 660 $$$$

Mao Dupla Restaurante Whether you eat in or on the cobbled street outside, this restaurant exudes authentic charm. The menu features unpretentious, home-cooked local dishes. Rua Santa Isabel 10 $$

Restaurant Paraíso Tropical The food and atmosphere are worth the effort required to find this place, tucked away amid lush vegetation in an obscure neighborhood. Many ingredients are picked fresh from the garden. Rua Edgar Loureiro 98-B, Cabula $$$

Salvador Info to Go

International and domestic flights arrive at Deputado Luís Eduardo Magalhães International Airport (SSA), 17 miles northeast of downtown. Although there are direct connections with Miami and some European cities, the majority of international passengers arrive via São Paulo Guarulhos Airport (GRU). The fixed-rate taxi fare from the airport to downtown is currently $47.

Read more about Bahia here.