Fado: Songs of Nostalgia

"Buenas noches," I sing to Joao as I approach the tour bus. His cigarette smoke forms a haze around us on this balmy evening in Lisbon. It's become our tradition to chat before leaving for the evening's entertainment. "Boa noite," he corrects me. "That is how you say 'Good Evening.' We are in Portugal now!"

Joao is from a "laid-back area" of Portugal, and that's a good thing for me. For the past six days, he has been our driver through the Spanish countryside and has patiently tolerated my mangled attempts at both Spanish and Portuguese.

And he's right--we are in Portugal now. Soon our tour bus is working its way to the hilltop town of Sintra, located 30 minutes outside Lisbon. Once called "a glorious Eden" by the poet Lord Byron, Sintra is a hot spot for tourists looking for a day trip from Lisbon.

Our bus lumbers up the windy hill. The streets are terribly narrow and the bus barely misses scraping the parked cars. I turn to my husband, Mark, and clench his hand. Suddenly the bus stops--there's just not enough room for it to pass. We sit impatiently for a moment until a man sprints from a nearby restaurant. "Meu carro!" he shouts. He hops in his tiny Smartcar and speeds up the hill.

An air of excitement permeates throughout the bus. Tonight, our group is going to see a performance of fado--Portugal's famous folk music.

The word "fado" comes from the Latin fatum, meaning "fate." The musical origins are murky, but most agree that the working class, particularly fisherman, introduced it to the masses. Fado music began showing up in bars in Lisbon around the beginning of 19th century. Nathalie, a Portuguese native whose father was friends with a fado singer, says, "Fado is to Portugal what flamenco is to Spain."

Fado songs are characterized by a feeling of longing or nostalgia. The Portuguese call it saudade, and it is hard to translate precisely into English. Catarina, who was born in the Azores off the coast of Portugal, is currently working far from home. She describes it as "the need to travel in your mind to a time or place where you were happy." Yet the bearer of the saudade always knows it may never really return.

Catarina believes everyone can feel saudade, adding, "There's something that I miss so much. Maybe the sea or the people. Maybe that's what Portuguese people feel when they leave for the USA and other countries."

"Fado is part of that Portuguese 'identity' for many people."

The songs' melancholy nature may come from Moorish or Brazilian influences. Portugal was under Moorish rule until the 12th century, and Portuguese sailors in the 1800s often encountered Brazilian slaves. Perhaps the homesickness of both the sailors and slaves influenced the themes.

On the drive to Sintra, we are told that Antonio de Oliveira Salazar's dictatorship in the mid-twentieth century played a part in popularizing fado. He was worried that fado singers were injecting political commentary into their songs. Soon fado singers had to be licensed and could only perform in certain "fado houses."

Tour groups typically attend fado in an older section of central Lisbon--the Barrio Alto--where fado performers are now free to sing along the alleys or in taverns. Heather, our tour guide, prefers to take her groups off the beaten path. Sheis been going to Sintra for over 10 years and asks, "Why sit in a big room with two other tour groups?"

She has a point. The Pateo do Garrett restaurant is a family-run operation, and its clientele consists mainly of locals. Called casas de fado, establishments like the Pateo do Garrett combine dinner, singing, and dancing.

After descending a flight of stairs, we arrive in the fado hall. It is two small rooms with five or six tables and a small stage. There's also a tiny dance area. Tonight, our tour group has the opportunity to mingle with locals, including an elderly gentleman there to celebrate his 90th birthday.

We're served a traditional Portuguese meal, and plate after plate comes out quickly: an appetizer of pasteis de bacalhau--deep fried, breaded coquettes made from cod, potatoes, onion, and parsley; bread with ham; salad mixto with oil; and leek and herb broth soup. The main course is a choice of fish or pork and clams, both with vegetables, rice, and potatoes. (I choose the fish; Mark gets the pork.) Wine--red and white--flows freely. (Mark and I have both.)

Dessert is chocolate mousse topped with brandy. Several tour mates beg off the brandy, but the servers ignore their pleas, dousing it with a substantial portion.

Halfway through the meal, the lights are dimmed, and the fado singer, or fadista, launches into her first song. Fadistas can be male or female, but most listeners prefer the emotion of the female fadista. Our fadista performs in traditional garb, wearing a black shawl and standing still, using her voice and gestures to convey emotion.

Locals can be demanding when it comes to their fadista. They insist on only the most heartfelt performers, saying that one must have the soul to transmit that feeling; a fadista who does not possess saudade is thought of as inauthentic.

Our singer is one reason Heather keeps returning to the Pateo do Garrett. "She has the voice of an angel," Heather exclaims.

Heather has warned us that it is disrespectful to talk during the performance. Even if we do not understand the words, she says, "Try to get a feel for it through the tone of her voice and her facial expressions."

Lyrically, the songs are in the traditional fado vein:

"Why did you leave me,
Where did you go?
I walk the streets looking at every place we were together,
Except you're not there..."

While only a keyboardist accompanies this fadista, shows in Lisbon catering to the tourists tend to be larger productions. Traditional fado consists of a singer accompanied by one or two guitar players. Modern fado performances may have a full orchestra.

In between numbers, this fado performance includes folk dancers not typically part of a show. The dancers are a family from Sintra, consisting of several generations of married couples, teenagers, and children as young as six. They wear colorful but conservative costumes--flowing skirts for the ladies, vests and pants tucked into boots for the men--outfits you'd expect a folk dancer to wear. We clap along as they pile onto the tiny stage, twirling and stomping their feet.

Several members of the tour are pulled from their seats to join the dance, blushing and protesting. Boom, an exuberant traveler from the Philippines, whirls among the waitresses, finally stopping to drag Heather onto the floor.

Mark and I cheer as Juan and Lara join in. They are from Ecuador and have been married for 50 years; we've shared several meals with them. Mark quickly snaps a sweet, perfect picture of the diminutive Juan spinning his beloved.

More couples move to the dance floor, and as the music slows, the fadista breaks into a powerful--if slightly out of context--rendition of Celine Dion's "The Power of Love." Shortly after, the night's festivities come to an end.

The drive back to the hotel is not as eventful as the drive to Sintra, but it is soothing. Heather plays Rod Stewart's "The Great American Songbook" over the bus' loudspeaker:

"I see skies of blue and clouds of white
The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world."

To the full and tipsy tourists, that glimpse into the centuries-old fado tradition proves it is a wonderful world indeed.