Folk Singers: The Joys of Suffering

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Fados, the bittersweet songs of Portugal, are like rare vintage wines: they don't travel well. They are best savored in the small lantern-lit taverns tucked away in the cobblestone alleys of old Lisbon. There, in an atmosphere drenched with pathos and the aroma of musky wine and spicy sausages, the black-draped fadistas cry out in voices quavering with anguish. Against a back ground of weeping guitars, they sing of sin and love gone wrong, of wasted lives and impending doom. Fado means destiny, and its baleful laments are more than the fatalistic Portuguese can bear: old men weep and women grow faint, all revelling in the joys of suffering.

Fado is to Portugal what flamenco is to Spain, what the blues is to the U.S. (TIME, Feb. 7, 1964). Yet, unlike those widely exported musical forms, fado has been taken abroad successfully by only one singer: Amália Rodrigues. Last week, at the behest of Conductor Andre Kostelanetz, she made her U.S. concert debut with the New York Philharmonic as part of its summer Promenades series. Singing fado in the rich expanse of Philharmonic Hall—with the audience sitting at café tables sipping champagne and munching Fritos—seemed as out of place as singing spirituals in a salon. But no matter. The slight, darkly beautiful Amalia created her own special atmosphere. She put on her black shawl and, backed by four guitars, filled the hall with her smoky voice, tossing her head back to sound the chilling, soulful plaint of the fado. It was gutsy, gripping singing, full of yearning and remorse, and the audience called her back again and again for encores.

Sinister Green Thumb. At 45, Amália has been the queen of fado for more than 20 years. But she is a vagabond queen, rationing her performances at home to tour the world. In Lisbon, variety-show comics crack that Portugal has everything that the rest of the world has—except Amália. "The Portuguese are jealous lovers," says Amália. "They say that I drink, that I am a spy, that I work for the secret police, that I sing only for ministers." Actually, her most sinister possession is a green thumb, with which she tends the garden of her 18th century home in Lisbon.

Since Amália performs only infrequently in Portugal, fado has lately fallen into a state of flux. Many of the old fado taverns, looking for the tourist dollar, are pushing pop fado, an attempt to internationalize the art by adding drums and clarinet to the traditional guitar accompaniment. Its chief exponent is sunny Maria da Fe, 24, who sings such classics as It's as Empty and Cold as My Heart to a sizzling jazz beat. Pop fado has also given rise to such variations as the upbeat "new-look fado" and "fado blues." And at the University of Coimbra, the students have turned their romantic ballads into protest songs, at least one of which was virulent enough to be banned by the government.