Portuguese Fado Music and American Jazz Saxophone: Is There a Connection? Oh yeah
Fado music reveals the heart and soul of Portugal
Fado is a style of music that originated in Portugal in the early 19th century. Influences possibly came from the Moors, Arabia, and Africa, all of whom the Portuguese had contact with. The Moors were Muslims from North Africa who occupied Portugal and Spain between the years 700 and 1500. They were eventually expelled by the Crusaders, but left behind great influences on food, cuisine, architecture, and music.
Many North Americans have never heard of fado, which is not surprising since it is not played on the local commercial radio station. Those I have met and have had the opportunity to listen to usually fall in love with it. Musically, it is very easy on the ears and follows a predictable musical pattern. I think it has similarities with Blues in America. Not so much in the 1, 1V, V harmonic chord progression that blues is based on, but in the way the music itself came about and what it means and represents for its people and country today. difficulties, the same things that a blues song is usually about. Sonically it sounds very different.
I hated this music when I was a kid! Sitting in the backseat of my parents’ car, forced to listen to it, not understanding the lyrics, and it sounded so strange next to the pop radio stations I listened to in my spare time. I avoided it when I could and basically forgot about it as I got older.
One day in my 20s and occasionally with the saxophone, I heard a recording of Portuguese jazz saxophonist Rao Kyao playing Fado music on his saxophone, no singing, just beautiful melodies played by a tenor. This put it in a whole new light for me. I guess I started hearing it differently as it was a saxophone talking to me instead of an old Portuguese singer singing about things I couldn’t understand, although I could understand this… Listen to Rao Kyao
The typical instrumentation is 2 Portuguese guitars which in Portuguese is called a guitara and 2 regular nylon string acoustic guitars which the Portuguese call a viola.
Fado’s biggest star was Amalia Rodrigues, who died a few years ago but was active for most of the second half of the 20th century. She was known and appreciated internationally and brought fado from Portugal to the world. Plays and movies have been written about her….
He also brought one of America’s great tenor saxophonists into the studio with his group to play saxophone on some tracks. Don Byas was a contemporary of Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young, the great saxophonists of the early swing jazz era in America around 1940. But Byas moved to Europe, living in France, Holland, and Denmark in the mid-1940s and remaining there for the rest. of his life. Fortunately, while in Portugal for a brief moment, he was called in for a studio session with the great Amalia and thus history was made with one of the greatest tenor saxophonists in American jazz along with the greatest Portuguese fado singer.
If you’ve never heard fado music, do yourself a favor and check it out!
