Grupo de Capoeira Angola Pelourinho

GCAP (Grupo de Capoeira Angola Pelourinho) is a Capoeira Angola school founded by Mestre Moraes in Rio de Janeiro in 1980 and re-based in Salvador, Bahia in 1982, where it became one of the organizations credited with reviving Capoeira Angola after Mestre Pastinha's death. It is now headquartered at the Forte da Capoeira in the Santo Antônio Além do Carmo/Pelourinho district of Salvador.

GCAP was founded on October 5, 1980 in the Cosme Velho neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro. Its founders were Mestre Moraes and fellow capoeiristas Antonio Neves Braga (Mestre Braga), Marco Aurélio, José Carlos Gonçalves (Zé Carlos) and "Neco" — all of whom had been graduated as mestres together on December 16, 1978 at Parque Lage, reportedly the first titling of Capoeira Angola mestres outside Bahia. The idea for the association is credited to Neco; Braga designed the original GCAP emblem, depicting a berimbau flanked by two zebras, a reference to Moraes's theory linking capoeira's origins to n'golo, a Bantu combat/dance ritual from southwestern Angola. The group's stated purpose was to preserve and transmit the teachings Moraes had received from his own mentor, João Grande (himself a disciple of Mestre Pastinha alongside João Pequeno), and to "rescue" capoeira's African philosophical roots at a time when the more codified, increasingly commercial Capoeira Regional dominated the scene.

In 1982 Moraes relocated to Salvador and re-based GCAP there. Cobra Mansa — his student since 1974, who had moved to Salvador in 1981 — co-organized the Salvador school with him. The move coincided with a fragile moment for Capoeira Angola: Mestre Pastinha had died in 1981, and the tradition risked disappearing as a living practice, seen by many as "an art for elderly men." GCAP's young, energetic cohort helped reverse that trend, and its efforts, together with Cobra Mansa's, persuaded João Grande to end a roughly six-year retirement and resume teaching, with GCAP, in the mid-1980s. Moraes is also credited with formalizing/codifying the Angolan musical liturgy — the toques and instrumental ensemble (berimbau, atabaque, pandeiro) — as a required, integrated part of GCAP's curriculum rather than mere accompaniment. Young practitioners who trained at GCAP through the 1980s and into the early 1990s included Janja, Paulinha, Poloca and Valmir, among others.

The mid-1990s brought a wave of departures that reshaped the wider Angola movement. Braga had already left around 1993/94 to found Grupo Africa Bantu. In 1994 Valmir also left GCAP. A rift between Moraes and Cobra Mansa over the school's direction led to Cobra Mansa's departure together with Valmir and Jurandir Nascimento; together they founded the International Capoeira Angola Foundation (FICA) in 1995/96. Separately, Janja moved to São Paulo in 1995 to pursue graduate study and, together with Paulinha and Poloca — all three coming out of roughly a decade or more inside GCAP — founded Grupo Nzinga, described as the first Capoeira Angola organization founded by a woman.

GCAP itself remained in Salvador under Moraes's leadership. Capoeiristas associated with the group occupied the derelict Forte de Santo Antônio Além do Carmo, and that occupation is credited with helping drive the fort's restoration; it reopened in 2006 as the "Forte da Capoeira," functioning as Bahia's reference, research and memory center for capoeira, and has served since as a hub for GCAP's activities. Moraes has continued to lead GCAP as a cultural-outreach project serving both long-time practitioners and local youth, while also working in Salvador's public school system.