Portuguese Story-Telling

One of the musical highlights as this year’s The Script Road will certainly be a performance by Fado singer Cristina Branco. As part of a new generation of Fado singers in Portugal, she has brought innovation to the genre while still respecting its roots, often infusing a real sense of joy into a style of music that is renowned for its melancholy.

 

In her youth, Cristina had no ambitions to be a singer, let alone a Fado singer.  She was originally planning to study journalism, but on her 18th birthday her grandfather gave her an album of rare and unreleased recordings by Fado diva Amalia Rodrigues, which would come to change the direction of her life dramatically.

Interestingly, Cristina’s first real commercial success came not in Portugal, but in Holland where she first performed at the age of 24. Even at that stage, she did not consider herself to be even an amateur singer.  

 

Nonetheless, Cristina has since found great success with Fado, bringing new life to this traditional music with her originality and sensuousness. Last year she performed over 50 concerts around the world including in Spain, Germany, France, Austria, Bulgaria, Holland and even in New Caledonia.  She also appeared at the Ankara Jazz Festival in Turkey and with the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra.

 

 

Cristina Branco: What I like to do during my concerts is tell a story of a little bit of Portuguese history and a little bit of Fado and Portuguese language, and that is done for everyone to understand. So if there are people in my audiences from all over the world then that’s fantastic because my message will always basically be the same, because that’s the story I want to tell people. 

 

I want people to understand what I’m doing, regardless of whether it’s Fado or not. I want it to be as universal as possible, of course at the same time respecting all the roots, but keeping it accessible so everyone can understand it.

 

Of course, the platform on which I stand is Portuguese literature.  I feel it’s important for me that people get acquainted with my culture and music, and build up an understanding of what Portugal is, what the Portuguese language is. That’s the way I like to do music and to perform.

 

If you think of Fado and its roots then it’s not universal no. But if you think of it as a type of music that you can transport to other universes… A lot of people say that it is the Portuguese Blues, so if it’s similar to the Blues then it’s about people and about feelings, and that is universal, it’s not exclusively Portuguese.  Fado is very dramatic, it’s very nostalgic and melancholy, but it’s much more than that.  

 

For me it makes sense, it’s my natural environment, where I come from, so it’s not complicated for me to interpret Portuguese authors and be related to Portuguese literature. On the contrary, I’m delighted to do that and I was very honoured to receive this invitation.  Because that’s what I do with my music. Of course it’s Fado, but it’s also Portuguese literature.  

 

It’s absolutely a source of inspiration. Before I started singing I always enjoyed reading and I was always surrounded by words. For me it was natural when I decided to begin this strange life of music and travel, to bring literature into it, because I couldn’t sing without having good words to sing.  It wouldn’t make sense. 

Now what I really love to do is interpret Portuguese literature and somehow bring it to different people. Some people don’t like to read and are not acquainted with certain authors, so when you sing those authors then you take literature to those people who wouldn’t otherwise know it.  And my dream is that eventually they may even become interested in reading the literature for themselves after hearing my music.

 

I like many different kinds of literature. In English, I like Ernest Hemingway a lot. In fact just recently I wrote a few lines from him.  I like poetry and within Portuguese literature my favourite is Pessoa, although I don’t sing him that much these days.

 

It’s difficult because I’ve seen so many wonderful cultures and beautiful people around the world, but one place I visit a lot is Holland. I definitely love the Dutch. And I also love Japan and that culture.  They might seem a bit different at first, but I like the way that they both preserve their countries and their cultures, and they have a natural tendency for order, everything is so perfect.  But on the other hand, I love the opposite too. I love Africa, I love complicated countries with complicated architecture.  I love that as well and I really feel good there. 

 

It’s probably the album that has taken me longest to make, because we are making some changes and we are really thinking about it very, very carefully.  The title will be Menina which means little girl, so it’s about feminimity, it’s about women in their most vibrant stages, about the way women – and myself – position themselves in society and the way society views women in their different stages.  I’m really enjoying making this album.  It’s taking me beyond my expectations. 

 

I will definitely be performing some of these new songs in Macau, so my audience there will sort be guinea pigs for this new album. I want to see how people react so I’m going to test it out on them (laughs). It’s the first time I’ve done it like this so I hope people will enjoy it and appreciate it.

 

….