The Fado contains elements from Folk, soul, blues, Blue-Grass (variety of the Country), and miscellaneous others. Also a certain Arabic impact is to be heard. The topics of the songs can be derived from the name itself. The Fado (lat. fatum = fate") can be translated best with "fate-chant ". The songs mainly tell from big longing, unfulfilled love, broken hearts, no longer coming back seafarers and religious topics. For the sum of all melancholy-longing emotions, that is processed in the Fado, the Portugueses have even an own word: the "saudade ". Look for an unambiguous translation for this idiom once - besides paraphrases you will probably find nothing.
On Madeira (as well as in Portugal itself) you find small Fado-bars and Fado-restaurants, that you should visit during a Madeira-trip necessarily once. The intensity, with which the singers, mostly women, tell "their" stories, is unique. If mood and public attunes, the singer can sing himself into a trance-like condition, in which the protagonist is experiencing the ailment and the longing, which he describes. It is fascinating, stirring and an absolutely unique experience. Even, if you are not familiar with the Portuguese language, you can hardly escape the effect.
Also here it is, like with the folklore, amazingly, with like few instruments here a gigantic portion music can be generated. One to two Fado-guitars and a little percussion are mostly enough.
Here in western europe the Fado is virtually unknown. The name Amalia Rodriguez should be known to some fans and music-connoisseurs. She is regarded as the Fado-Queen of Portugal. The fado, which you can buy here on Fado-CDs on the western european market in some well assorted specialist, has only barely to do with the real one, due to the usually complete musical band-cast with Keyboard, Drums and smoothed chant. Therefore, I can recommend you very much to visit a Fado-bar or a Fado-restaurant on Madeira.
|
|
||
|
|
|
 |
||