A Defense of Fado: Victor Machado’s Ídolos do Fado (1937)

By Anton Garcia-Fernandez.



Published in 1937, Victor Machado’s Ídolos do Fado (Idols of Fado) is still widely regarded today as one of the most important reference books on fado ever written. The work is certainly a product of its time: in the 1930s, the early years of the Salazar regime, several intellectuals and scholars debated over whether fado should be scorned as one of the vilest, basest products of Portuguese culture, or whether it should be praised for its positive qualities and the possibilities that it offered as a vehicle for the education of the masses. This debate was already current at the turn of the twentieth century, yet it reached its peak in the 1930s, with the appearance of texts that fiercely argued for one side or the other. In 1936, Luís Moita published Fado, Canção de Vencidos (Fado, Song of the Defeated), a collection of lectures broadcast on national radio in which he vilifies fado attributing all the evils of contemporary Portuguese society to the genre and its practitioners. Machado’s Ídolos do Fado was conceived as a response to Moita’s work, and although many of its arguments are as hyperbolic as Moita’s, it still comes across today as an unapologetic, heartfelt defense of the beauty of fado and its long tradition. Machado not only aims at exalting the virtues of fado, but he also offers short biographies of some of the best fado singers of the time originated in interviews that he personally conducted with them, along with the lyrics of songs with which they were associated. Therefore, beyond the specific historical context in which it was written, the work contains a wealth of first-hand information about classic fadistas and is profusely illustrated with photographs. For the purpose of this review, it will suffice to concentrate on the first three chapters of the book, which encapsulate Machado’s critical approach to his subject.



Entitled “Vencidos… não!” (“Defeated… no!”), a clear reference to the title of Moita’s work, the first chapter begins with a fiery defense of fado, leaving Machado’s agenda perfectly clear: “May those who do not feel, do not understand, or refuse to understand fado leave it alone” (11). Drawing from writings by authors such as Fontes Martins and Júlio Dantas [see picture above], Machado attempts to dissociate fado from its origins in roguery and crime, underscoring the fact that it is not popular merely among the working class, but also among the aristocracy. Machado attempts to debunk the stereotype of the fadista as a criminal, counteracting Moita’s conception of fado singers and aficionados as defeated, degenerate people: “A style of music does not create degenerates,” Machado quotes from Dantas, “but perhaps degenerates may have a predilection for this or that style” (13). Machado consciously characterizes fadistas as as honest, hard-working people who become successful by virtue of their artistry. Thus, he argues that Moita’s view, which identifies fado with all the problems that plague Portuguese society, is erroneous: fado is not the song of the defeated because such a thing does not exist. To illustrate his point, Machado includes a quotation from a 1937 newspaper article by journalist Norberto de Araujo: “There are no songs of the defeated; there are simply defeated people. There are no songs of the sick; there are only sick people” (15). In order to push his point even further, toward the end of this first chapter, Machado offers quotes from several important writers, actors, journalists, and even aristocrats praising fado and explaining why they enjoy it. Some of these present the style as the essence of Portugal, a very common practice when it comes to legitimizing fado as a valuable art form.



The second chapter of the book, entitled “Do Passado ao Presente” (“From Past to Present”), is much more dense than the previous one. In spite of its title, Machado does not mean to write here an in-depth history of fado: he does mention the foundational myth of Maria Severa, yet he prefers to concentrate on a more recent time period—the late nineteenth century—when fado is embraced by the aristocracy and gains access to the theater stage. Once again, Machado stresses the difference between fado, that is, the music, and fadistismo, a term that he uses to refer to the background of roguery and crime with which its detractors associate the genre. He praises legendary fadistas such as Augusto Hilário, Ángela Pinto, and Júlia Mendes, some of whom met with an untimely death, arguing that they died from sickness and not because of their lifestyle as fado performers. Here, Machado is concerned with dignifying, and thus, he describes the process of popularization of the Portuguese guitar around the turn of the twentieth century, stressing the importance of musicians such as João Maria dos Anjos [see picture below], who contributed to the adoption of the instrument by the aristocracy. Once more, Machado mentions that these artists do not devote their whole lives only to fado, but rather that they also “work and provide for their families honestly, and their contact with fado . . . does not turn them into people unworthy of our society” (25).



One of Machado’s most interesting arguments in this chapter, although not completely devoid of hyperbole, is that fado should be valued for its poetic qualities as some of the best Portuguese folk poetry. In this sense, he argues that poetry is inextricably linked with the Portuguese people: “We come to the conclusion that every Portuguese person is a poet. In Portugal, even the less cultivated social classes boast their own improvisers. The tenderness and the poetic sensibility that we find in many of the quatrains that spring from the inspiration of some of our folk poets do not exist in the folk poetry of other countries” (26). Machado notes that many of these poetas populares do not receive much income from their compositions, which he attributes to the fact that a great number of people either did not care to read or were illiterate. According to Machado, this fruitful poetic activity is the reason for the proliferation of publications on fado, most of which, however, were short-lived due to lack of funding and a reduced readership. Although he offers a thorough list of fado journals, Machado stresses the key role of two of them, Guitarra de Portugal and Canção do Sul, and ends this chapter by positing that all journals should have the common goal of defending fado against its many detractors.



Finally, the third chapter completes Machado’s defense of fado, focusing on the preservation of its generic identity. Like other musical styles such as the blues or country music, fado has always been highly self-referential and acutely concerned with its generic boundaries, which are established by contrast with other genres or cultural expressions. In this chapter, Machado takes the point of view of a purist who attempts to prevent fado from being contaminated by other styles. Just like Roy Acuff did not accept the use of drums on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry, Machado is wary of fadistas who also sing tango, feeling that tango should not be sung alongside fado at fado houses. He takes a nostalgic look at a distant past when “the fadista was just a fadista” and “fado was sung with more affection and enthusiasm” (33). According to Machado, the staging of cegadas (short plays performed during Carnival celebrations and usually characterized by humor and social satire) at fado houses was also a threat to the integrity of fado, as was a part of the audiences that flocked to such venues simply to socialize and utter shallow comments about the music and not because they appreciated the beauty of fado. Machado dismisses this kind of audiences as “bad fado aficionados” (34) and very categorically states that perhaps they should not be granted admission into fado houses.



Despite its exaggerations and constant sententiousness, which should be understood in the light of the context in which it was written, Ídolos do Fado remains an extremely valuable piece of criticism on fado, as well as an interesting source of information on the lives, careers, and repertoires of the most important fadistas of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. At a moment when many intellectuals were criticizing fado for its alleged immorality and baseness, Machado attempted to put his point across in a very clear, simple manner, arguing for the beauty and poetic quality of fado and for the moral integrity of those who performed it. Unfortunately, Machado’s work is currently out of print: I have been able to use a copy of the first edition that I requested through interlibrary loan at Vanderbilt University, and I have no doubt that it is a book that definitely needs to be reissued.

Works Cited

A. Victor Machado. Ídolos do Fado. Lisbon: Tipografia Gonçalves, 1937.

Joaquim Pais de Brito on the Role of Fado in the Development of the City of Lisbon

By Anton Garcia-Fernandez.



The volume Antropologia Urbana: Cultura e Sociedade no Brasil e em Portugal, edited by Gilberto Velho, includes an excellent article by Joaquim Pais de Brito entitled “O Fado: Etnografia na Cidade,” in which he attempts to outline an ethnography of the city of Lisbon by taking a look at the relationships established between fado and the urban space throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The study considers the history of Lisbon in the light of the influence of fado in the cultural development of the city, while at the same time illustrating the development of fado as an art form.

As fado is a manifestly urban cultural expression, Pais de Brito is primarily concerned with the role that it played in the construction of an idea of city. The author admits that fado is not easy to define, that its nature is elusive and its boundaries difficult to set: “In everyday language, fado is a plural, fragmented, decentered reality” (24). Therefore, his article takes a markedly historical approach, going back to the early nineteenth century and taking a look at the different historical events that played a part in the evolution of the city of Lisbon, as well as in the creation of the social types that lived there. Lisbon’s social landscape was delineated throughout the nineteenth century, and toward the end of that century, four distinct social groups can be distinguished. First of all, there were the destitute, that is, poor people who did not have a stable job. On the other end of the social scale, there was a rapidly dwindling aristocracy that was beginning to feel the political changes brought about by liberalism. In between these two groups, there was an incipient working class that used fado as a means of vindication of its rights; for this working class, fado was instrumental in the definition of its class status. Finally, there was also the petty bourgeoisie, which had economic power, flocked to the theaters, and in time would start purchasing records and listening to the radio.



Pais de Brito underscores the influence that the new media of mass communication had on the sound of fado and the visual appearance of fadistas, and he also states that the figure of the fadista was created in the late nineteenth century by a series of authors such as Brito Aranha, Ramalho Ortigão, and even Eça de Queiroz. These writers depict the fadista as a heartless delinquent who frequents taverns and uses all kinds of violence and cheating in order to achieve his goals. For instance, Pais de Brito offers an excerpt from a text by Ramalho Ortigão [see picture below] that brings together the guitar and the knife in its description of the ways and looks of a fadista: “The tools of his trade are a guitar and a Santo Cristo, which is the slang term that they give to their knives” (31). Pais de Brito notes that these portraits of the fadista survive well into the twentieth century, even after the sense of immorality has been shed.



Indeed, the construction of the figure of the fadista continues in the first half of the twentieth century, with the appearance of a number of intellectuals who aimed at defining what fado was, attempting to channel their perception of the music and its performers in order to suit their ideological discourses. The controversy already starts in the 1910s, when Albino Forjaz de Sampaio criticizes fado for what he perceived to be its negative influence on Portuguese culture. This prompted Avelino de Sousa [see picture below] to publish his book O fado e os censores, in which he contradicts this negative view. In his opinion, fado can be used as a viable instrument to educate the illiterate working class.

After the military coup of 1926, intellectuals once again discuss whether fado should be rejected or embraced. In his 1936 book Fado, Canção de Vencidos (Fado, Song of the Defeated), a series of lectures read over the radio airwaves, Luís de Mota fiercely criticizes fado, ascribing all the evils of Portuguese society to this music. In 1937, Victor Machado’s Ídolos do fado (Idols of Fado), published as a response to Moita’s work, praised fado for its positive qualities within Portuguese society, thereby counteracting Moita’s attacks. According to Pais de Brito, the dictatorial regime appropriated fado, stripping it of its subversive elements and controlling it.



Toward the end of his article, Pais de Brito posits an outline of the different periods that can be observed in these two centuries of fado. First of all, he looks at its appearance in the cities of Lisbon around the 1830s, an early period that is highlighted by the love story between Maria Severa and the Count of Vimioso, which Pais de Brito calls fado’s “foundational myth” (33). By the 1860s we enter into a different period, as specific songwriters and performers begin to acquire popularity and to step outside of anonymity. This is the period in which fado subgenres and styles start to be defined, and at this stage, singers and dancers are still more popular than musicians.

Then, there is a long period that spans the late nineteenth century and the early years of the twentieth century, when fado is appropriated both by the aristocracy and the working class, the latter often using it in order to denounce social injustice. Fado now becomes the soundtrack of social events such as bullfights, singing the joys of city life and recording daily events and the dynamic relationships established between the social classes. During this crucial period, improvisation is extremely important because it determines the form of fado lyrics, that is, the use of improvised ten-line stanzas constructed upon a given quatrain. Some of the biggest names at this time are gifted improvisers such as Júlio Janota and Carlos Harrington. In the early years of the twentieth century, fado will graduate to the stage of theaters, and great performers such as Alfredo Duarte Marceneiro [see picture below] and Berta Cardoso, to name but two, become household names.



One final, also extremely important period, begins with the military coup that brings an end to the Republic in 1926. According to Pais de Brito, the coup thwarts this unfettered evolution of fado, changing the genre forever. The dictatorship enforced censorship and the professionalization of performers. During this period, records and radio will determine the sound and form of fado, favoring the construction of a specific, carefully planned image for the artist. This would explain, for example, the disappearance of the use of nicknames for the fadistas, traditionally linked to their professions outside of fado. There are exceptions, of course, such as Alfredo Duarte, who always used his nickname “Marceneiro,” meaning carpenter.

In short, this is a very interesting article, very well researched and full of pertinent information. Toward the end of the study, Pais de Brito underscores a fact that we sometimes tend to overlook: the iconography that we now associate with fado—the guitars and the stage image of the performers, for example—has not always been a part of fado. On the contrary, its creation is rather recent, harking back to as late as the 1920s.



Works Cited

Pais de Brito, Joaquim. “O fado: etnografia na cidade.” Gilberto Velho (ed.). Antropologia urbana: cultura e sociedade no Brasil e em Portugal. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar Editor, 1999: 24-42.

What Is Fado?

By Anton Garcia-Fernandez.

General introduction

As a little kid growing up in the city of Vigo, in the northwest of Spain, my parents would now and then drive my sister and me across the border to the little town of Valença do Minho, in Portugal. It was merely a 25-minute trip, I know, but to me it meant much more than that. The landscape on the other side of the Minho river, the natural barrier that separates Spain and Portugal, was not really different, yet it was this awareness of being in another country, in contact with another language and another culture, that made all the difference to me. This regular contact with Portuguese life, less than half an hour away from my hometown, led me to develop an interest in the Portuguese language and culture in general. In time, it would lead me to the discovery of fado, at first through releases by Amalia Rodrigues and Carlos do Carmo that my father had in his extensive record collection, and later through those by great fadistas such as Alfredo Marceneiro, Fernando Farinha, Maria Teresa de Noronha, Carlos Ramos, Lucilia do Carmo, Tony de Matos, Joaquim Silveirinha, and Filipe Pinto, to mention but a few.

Fado records were part of my luggage when I first came to the United States about five years ago: I play them constantly at home, and they are a regular part of my daily existence. However, I have found that the genre is largely unknown to English-speaking audiences; although it is possible to purchase fado recordings in the United States, not a great deal has been written about it in English. There are notable exceptions, such as Paul Vernon's A History of Portuguese Fado and Michael Colvin's The Reconstruction of Lisbon, yet for the most part, fado has not garnered major critical attention in English. As merely a collector of fado recordings and books about the style, it is not my intention to take a dry, serious critical approach to the intricacies of fado in this blog. I simply would like to present the music, its history, its foremost interpreters and composers, and its most important recordings to English-speaking audiences that may not be acquainted with them or with the Portuguese language. My area of scholarly research is mainly Spanish, English, and Portuguese literature; I am not a musicologist, and that is the reason why the articles published in All This Is Fado will deal mostly with the literary dimension of fado, as well as with specific songs, recordings, songwriters, and interpreters. I humbly submit these articles to the readers' scrutiny, hoping that they will be informative and interesting. If I succeed in getting people exposed to and interested in fado music, all my efforts will have been rewarded. Now, to the matter...

A Brief Sketch of the History of Fado

A Portuguese popular saying describes the essence of fado in the following fashion: "Fado can't be seen or heard; it simply happens" (“O fado não se vê nem se ouve; simplesmente acontece”). Like any sententious phrase, this is an extremely obscure utterance, but it is very much to the point, since fado has always defied a clear-cut definition, and its origins, in spite of the efforts of scholars, remain very much in the dark. In a recent message sent to me, Vitor Duarte, the grandson of the great fadista Alfredo Marceneiro, argues that the most important aspect of fado is that it is essentially Portuguese. Notwithstanding the fact that some musicologists have attempted to locate its birth in Brazil, these theories are not stronly sustained, and there is no doubt that throughout the twentieth century, fado became a musical symbol of Portugal, so much so that it has been described as "true expression of the Portuguese soul." Yet, like the saying above, this nationalist-laden description of the genre is not enough: fado does hail from and is mostly sung in Portugal, and so describing it merely as Portuguese does not seem to help very much.

The question of the musical/literary origins of fado, then, remains open to interpretation. Scholars have tried to document its birth with varying degrees of success, producing a number of theories about the subject, none of which are fully convincing. One of these theories traces the origins of the genre back to the traditional songs of the Arabic peoples that settled in Portugal during the Middle Ages. This theory, however, does not bear in mind the fact that fado only appeared in Portugal and not in the south of Spain, also populated by Arabic peoples around the same time period.

Another theory, beautifully developed in Pinto de Carvalho's classic study Historia do fado (1903), asserts that fado derives from a certain musical form known as lundum, brought to Portugal by sailors who used to cultivate it during their long sea journeys. Indeed, Portugal has always been a seafaring country, and this origin would explain the preponderance of sea-related themes in early fado lyrics. Yet, Pinto de Carvalho's explanation is not always consistent and convincing--although extremely poetic in its development--and so this theory is not widely accepted.

Other theories argue that fado harks back to the rich medieval tradition of troubadour love and satirical lyrics, themes that are still common in present-day fado. However, it could be argued that these are universal themes, and most important, fado did not take root in other parts of Spain that boasted medieval poetry traditions such as that of Portugal.

Whatever the origins of fado may be, Eduardo Sucena (1) divides its historical development into three different periods. First of all, fado appears in Lisbon toward 1822, and in these early years, instrumental compositions and dancing are more important than lyrics and singing. The second period begins around 1840, when the use of the guitar becomes more prominent and the popularity of fado singing overtakes that of dancing. Finally, by 1888, fado is taken to the university city of Coimbra, and it is gradually accepted across social classes and appropriated by the aristocracy. This tendency toward crossing social boundaries is a key element of fado from its earliest years, as the story of Maria Severa (1820-1846) amply proves. The figure of Severa, a Lisbon prostitute who played guitar and sang fado, has acquired a somewhat mythical dimension that makes it difficult to differentiate fact from fiction. Her love affair with the Count of Vimioso, a nobleman who appreciated fado, is widely seen as the first of many contacts between the nobility and the fado-singing working class, and as such, it is sung and remembered in many song lyrics. The pathos of Severa's story, brought to an abrupt end by her untimely death, as well as its iconographic importance within the universe of fado, calls for a separate article in this blog.

The advent of radio, phonographic records, and the cinema during the first half of the twentieth century changed fado forever, standardizing its sound and the image of its performers and creating an idea of genre. It was then that fado, originally synonymous with poverty, crime, roguery, and the lower social strata, acquired national and international exposure. Its interpreters, names such as Alfredo Marceneiro, Armandinho, Ercilia Costa, Berta Cardoso, Amalia Rodrigues, and Frutuoso França, among many others, also gained widespread recognition singing on radio, on records, in movies, in theaters, and in special establishments known as fado houses (casas de fado). The physical image, dress code, and stage presence of the fadista were also constructed around this time, with black as the predominant color of the performer's outfit, in sync with a half-lit stage and a serious, almost stoic countenance. These elements are so very much inscribed in the popular imaginary of the Portuguese people that even the new, more innovative stars of the genre (Mariza, Katia Guerreiro, Camane) respect these prescriptions to a great extent.

Instrumentation, Lyrical Dimension, and Styles

The typical musical accompaniment of fado is rather sparse, usually consisting solely of stringed instruments such as the classical guitar (known in Portuguese as viola), the bass guitar (viola-baixo) used to stress the rhythm, and the Portuguese guitar (guitarra). The latter is closely associated with the style, and its special tuning gives fado its recognizable tinkling sound. The Portuguese guitar is a very versatile instrument, and over the decades, great instrumentists like Armandinho, Raul Nery, António Chainho, and Artur Paredes have experimented with it and perfected its sound and devised innovative playing techniques. Even though fado singing is usually accompanied by these stringed instruments, there are many recordings on which the singer is backed by a whole orchestra, and Amália Rodrigues even cut a magnificent record accompanied by saxophone great Don Byas (2).

One of the most appealing aspects of fado lies in the lyrics of its songs, in which the poetic element becomes crucial. The best fado compositions are usually a perfect marriage of melody and lyrics, yet sometimes poetry prevails over the music, since many songwriters often create new lyrics for already existing tunes. The poetic universe of fado is dominated by the letmotif of saudade, a deeply nostalgic feeling of longing and yearning for love, for one's homeland, or for a past that will never be recovered. Being a mostly urban cultural expression, the city is another key element of fado, whose lyrics constantly reference the experience of the city (mostly Lisbon and Coimbra), describing its people, its neighborhoods, its festivities, its dark corners, and its grand avenues. More traditional lyrics hark back to fado's possible pre-urban existence, depicting country scenes, character types, and popular traditions. The theme of the sea is also quite recurrent, as is that of Portugal as the singer's motherland, an aspect that reveals how fado lyrics strive to come to terms with the idea of national identity. Just like other styles such as blues or country music, fado sometimes becomes self-referential, attempting to define its essence and generic boundaries, as well as celebrating some of its myths (Maria Severa, for instance) and foremost musical representatives (Armandinho, Alfredo Marceneiro, Amália Rodrigues, Ercília Costa). Finally, many poems by some of Portugal's great poets (Luís de Camões, Fernando Pessoa, Miguel Torga, José Carlos Ary dos Santos) have been set to music and entered the repertoire of fadistas.



Fado is cultivated mainly in two geographic areas of Portugal, Lisbon and Coimbra, which has given rise to two distinct styles of understanding and performing this kind of music. In Lisbon—as well as in Porto—fado is usually performed by fadistas dressed in black, and many of the songs touch upon the typical themes of unrequited love, the dark side of life, and popular urban traditions and characters. Most Lisbon fado compositions are actually story songs: they narrate a story that is sometimes more complex than others. In Coimbra, fado is closely related to its ancient university, performed only by male musicians and singers who don traditional student costumes for the occasion. The fado of Coimbra has more affinities with popular ballads and folksongs than that of Lisbon, and many of its performers (José Afonso, for instance) fully embraced this traditional folk element. Not as well-known as Lisbon fado, the Coimbra style boasts many important names such as Edmundo Bettencourt, Augusto Hilário, António Menano, and the guitarists Artur and Carlos Paredes.

Finally, as far as the nature of its melody and its lyrical structure, there are several different styles of fado. Frederico de Freitas (3) notes that fado is "an essentially syllabic kind of song, as are generally most Portuguese popular melodies," and that the poetic structure of most compositions consists of quatrains made out of seven, ten, or twelve syllables. Sometimes, fado melodies are uptempo (a style known as fado corrido), and in many cases, two or more fadistas improvise the lyrics in a contest sort of fashion (fado à desgarrada or fado ao desafio). According to de Freitas, there are many other recognizable styles of fado, namely fado balada, fado nocturno, fado serenata, and fado marcha, among many others, whose characteristics we will have the chance to explore in forthcoming posts.

Notes

(1) Eduardo Sucena. Lisboa, o fado e os fadistas. Lisbon: Edições Vega, 1992: 9-16.
(2) Amália Rodrigues and Don Byas. Encontro. Valentim de Carvalho, 1973.
(3) Frederico de Freitas. O fado, canção da cidade de Lisboa. Lisbon, 1973: 233-4.