Article Launched: 04/19/2007 01:42:36 AM PDT
At first glance, Cape Verde seems an extreme long shot to become the next world-music hot spot. Made up of 10 main islands off the coast of Senegal, the former Portuguese colony is barely larger in area than Rhode Island; it boasts a population of 420,000 (though endemic poverty has resulted in a far-flung diaspora of another half million).
Cesaria Evora's rise to prominence in the late 1980s put the West African nation on the international musical map. Outside the Portuguese-speaking world, she has continued to reign as the sole voice of Cape Verde. But with a confluence of influences from Portugal, Brazil and West Africa nurturing a musical culture as rich as the islands are barren, a new generation of Cape Verdean singers is coming to the fore.
Sara Tavares, Fantcha, Maria de Barros, Gardenia Benro`s and Maria Alice all have released impressive albums with distribution in the United States and Europe. None, however, is better placed to step onto the world stage than Lura, who makes her Cal Performances debut Friday at Wheeler Auditorium in Berkeley, and performs Saturday at Rio Theatre for the University of California-Santa Cruz's Arts & Lectures program.
"Cesaria is like our mother," says Lura, 31, one of the rising Cape Verdean artists featured on the extensive 2001 European tour Cesaria & Friends. (Evora herself will perform at San Francisco's Masonic Auditorium on June 9, as part of the SFJazz Spring Season.) "She makes Cape Verdean culture known all over the world. She does it very seriously, and I learned a lot with her. I learned where my place is in music from Cape Verde and what I have to do."
Delivering contemporary songs in Cape Verdean Crioulo with her deep, sultry contralto, Lura is a captivating performer steeped in traditional styles but interested in a vast range of sounds. Born and raised in Lisbon, she started her career as a dancer but realized she had a gift for singing when Cape Verdean-born zouk star Juka recruited her to record with him.
A duet they recorded was a minor hit, and the budding teenage singer suddenly started receiving requests from established figures such as Tito Paris, Paulinho Vieira and Angola's Bonga. She recorded her first album, "Nha Vida," in 1996, and made a splash when the title track was included on the 1997 AIDS benefit compilation "Onda Sonora: Red Hot \+ Lisbon," alongside pieces by stars such as Caetano Veloso, Djavan, Marisa Monte and k.d. lang.
Like a number of other young Cape Verdean singers, Lura is determined to spread awareness of styles beyond the lilting minor-key mornas and sprightly coladeras popularized by Evora. Lura has delved into accordion-based funana, a sensuous style long repressed by Cape Verde's Portuguese colonial administration before independence in 1975, and batuku, a rhythm that originated among groups of women beating folded stacks of clothes, accompanied by topical, often satirical improvised verses.
Her gorgeous third album, "Di Korpu Ku Alma" (Lusafrica, 2005), features five batukus, including her signature tunes "Na Ri Na" and "Vazulina," by Orlando Panteira, a gifted composer who died before he had a chance to release his own album. "Di Korpu" also features a separate DVD shot during a 2004 concert opening for Evora at Le Grand Rex in Paris, which captures Lura's infectious, youthful energy.
Her second U.S. release, "M'bem Di Fora (I Come From the Country)," came out in March on Times Square Records. It continues her exploration of her family's rural Cape Verdean roots, with a strong tinge of jazz and R&B.
"There's a new generation, and I'm just a piece of a puzzle," Lura says, speaking by phone from her home in Lisbon. "We sing and play traditional music from Cape Verde with influences from all over the world - soul, reggae, blues, samba."
That Lura was born outside of Cape Verde makes her an apt representative for the country. Instead of being tied to the sounds of one island, she claims the entire archipelago as her muse. Rather than simply absorbing Cape Verdean culture, she decided to embrace it after her mother discouraged her from speaking Crioulo as a child.
"I feel I can show other people all the different rhythms and styles," Lura says. "Sometimes there's a little chauvinism inside. For example, the people of Sao Vicente think that it's the best, that all the beautiful things are happening there, and the other islands are not very good. I'm trying to show that every island has something good, and that we complement and need each other."
