The 7 best Fado tracks of all time
Fado
Portuguese urban song, born in the taverns and back streets of Lisbon, built on a voice, a Spanish guitar and the pear-shaped Portuguese guitarra. Its subject is saudade — longing for something that may never have existed.
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Amália Rodrigues / Barco Negro
A woman on a beach insisting to herself that the drowned man will return. Amália is fado, and this is the performance that carried it out of Portugal without softening a syllable.
Amália Rodrigues / Estranha Forma de Vida
Her own lyric, set to an old fado, about a heart that goes its own way regardless. The most economical statement of what the form is for.
Amália Rodrigues / Lágrima
Late Amália, the voice worn and all the better for it. Written with Carlos Gonçalves, and the last great song she added to the standard repertoire.
Alfredo Marceneiro / Meu Amor É Marinheiro
The carpenter who sang, and the model every male fadista still works from. Marceneiro phrases against the guitars rather than with them, which is harder than it sounds.
Carlos do Carmo / Coimbra
Lisbon's other great voice, bringing arrangements and a lightness Amália never wanted. Carlos do Carmo is why fado had somewhere to go after her.
José Afonso / Balada da Despedida
Coimbra fado — the student tradition, sung by men in capes, and quite different from Lisbon's. Afonso later wrote the song that started a revolution; the discipline is audible here first.