Billboard, CD Review >>
As usual, Global Music Pulse's European correspondents use the first column of the new year to tip off readers to those acts that will make waves far beyond their own territories in the coming months.
FADO'S NEW FAVORITE: Portugal's new-wave fado singer Mariza looks set to establish herself as one of the biggest sensations in world music this year. The rise of the 29-year-old singer with the distinctively sculpted and bleached hair has been so swift that when Billboard ran a survey of emerging names in fado one year ago (Billboard, Jan. 26, 2002), Mariza was not even mentioned. Since then, her debut album on World Connection, Fado Em Mim (Fado in Me), has made such an impact that it has seen her acclaimed as "the new Amalia Rodrigues" (the acknowledged "queen of fado," who died in 1999) and gained her nominations in the BBC Radio 3 Awards for World Music as best European act and best newcomer. She is understood to have won in at least one of the categories and will perform at the awards concert in March in London. She went into the studio last month to begin recording her second album, due for release in early spring. Mariza says, "It's traditional fado, but it's my contemporary and personal interpretation of the music."
--Nigel Williamson 01/11/03
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