Fado

Our expert Portugal

Fado

Fado Musicians rehearse this tradtional song Vladimira Dvorakova / age fotostock;

Fado is the most typical style of music and song from Portugal. They express saudade(nostalgia) so very particular to the Portuguese and born from an indefinable lack of something, the absence of someone, homesickness, or a yearning for love. The origins of fado are uncertain; they could be the troubadours' songs, the laments of African slaves or of the court's penniless homecoming from a long exile in Brazil? Fado, from the Latin word ?fatum' meaning ?fate', fills the fado clubs in the old Lisbonian districts of Bairro Alto and Alfama every single night. There, you can have dinner until the fadista, a lady wrapped in a black shawl or a man dressed in dark clothes, comes into the room. ?Silence, fado is about to be sung? somebody announces. There is not a whisper in the room when a melancholic voice rises, accompanied by a twelve string Portuguese guitar.