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Mariza acts as ambassador for Portuguese fado
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By Aaron Cohen
Special to the Tribune

September 16, 2004

In any country, Mariza would command attention. Her short blond hair is set in rows above a face that could be
described as impish even though her songs emphasize a sense of deep longing. Playful humor amid waves of sadness leaps out through the singer's voice. But as a young torchbearer of Portuguese fado, Mariza's individualism departs from a long national tradition.

"At the beginning, I was a little bit afraid to be a little
different," Mariza says from her home in Lisbon. "I thought people would not like me and talk badly about me. But now even the most traditional fado singers call me to ask me how my concerts went when I return to Portugal from a tour."

These singers (fadistas) probably realized that the genial
Mariza is an ideal ambassador for their genre. She has
mastered fado's classic elongated phrasing and is a
discerning student of its lyrics' poetic lineage. Her
performance Tuesday as part of the city's World Music
Festival offers Chicagoans the chance to see the new twists that she is bringing to fado.

Fado is directly defined as "fate," but the musical meaning is more cathartic than dire. A key element in fado is saudade, a sense of melancholia that underlies everything from desperate love songs to meditative reflections on nature. Dressed in black, traditional fadistas seem painfully introverted until their pain builds to an explosion.

Paul Vernon contends in his 1998 book, "A History of the Portuguese Fado," that, "No fadista of caliber is without saudade and no audience of aficionados will tolerate the absence of it."

"We Portuguese people have that deep melancholy inside of us," Mariza says. "Don't ask us why we still have it; I
think it's been there for centuries and centuries of our
history."

While fado has been sung in Portuguese cafes for at least
150 years, like saudade, its origins go back much further.
As Portugal became a seafaring power, it began receiving
different kinds of guitars from across the Mediterranean and rhythms from around the world. But it took a while for the resulting music to reach a wide audience across the country.  Like the blues, Greek Rebetikaand Argentine tango, fado moved from its status on the disreputable fringes of society to become a celebrated national art.

Mariza has always been both a fado insider and outsider. She was born Mariza Nunes in Mozambique while that country was a Portuguese colony (it became independent in 1975). Her Portuguese father introduced her to fado while her Mozambican mother preferred Miriam Makeba. Yet fado's beats may have African roots and today Mariza says she "likes to use African percussion in a very soft way."

When Mariza was 3 years old, her family moved to the
Mouraria neighborhood of Lisbon, which is considered the part of the city where fado began. She started singing fado in the streets two years later. Understandably, Mariza's father kept the real heart-wrenching love songs away from her back then. At that time, fado had waned from the public consciousness in Portugal.

"Outside of the neighborhood, people were not used to
listening to fado," Mariza says. "And for them it was
especially strange to see a young girl singing fado. They
started saying to me, `Don't sing it! Fado is for old
people.'"

Because of Mariza's alluring voice, these general
assumptions disappeared as she began recording and
performing on the international circuit while in her 20s
about four years ago. Today, she is part of a wave of young fado singers who are following in the footsteps of such icons as Amalia Rodrigues. Another new fadista, Cristina Branco, will appear at the Old Town School of Folk Music on Oct. 9.

"Something is changing, and we have a young generation who are very interested in understanding this music," Mariza says. "I feel very happy with that."

The instrumental arrangements on Mariza's two discs, "Fado Em Mim" and "Fado Curvo" (Times Square), also break with long-standing fado norms. Usually, the music is performed with just two distinctive types of guitars -- the guitarra (or Portuguese guitar) and viola. Yet Mariza, who also listens to jazz and opera, adds a wider array of acoustic instruments, including percussion, piano and trumpet.

Recently, she performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. But Mariza will work with a more time-honored fado small ensemble for her Chicago concert.

"I like to show the audience that even using the most
traditional combo, I can sing in a different way. I can be
myself even using traditional things."