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Tell us a little bit about how you became a singer?
I became a singer when I took part in a school show due to one of the singers becoming ill: I knew the song so I took the role. It was my first time on stage but I had sung previously at home. I am from a big family and all my sisters played piano and sang all the time, as did my mother. (In Cap Vert mothers used to sing and dance with the little children).

Our language is the music and we know when it has to be calm or strong or in silence

Apart from your native Cape Verde, you have also spent time in Portugal and in Cuba (five years). How did this influence you as an artist?
I was born and lived in Cap Vert till I was 18 years old. My father’s Portuguese and my mama Capeverdean. To attend university, I went to Cuba in 1975, the year of the Capeverdean Independence. I’m from the 25th April generation. I lived 5 years in Cuba and 5 in Mexico where I married a Mexican man. Of course Cuba has a strong, rich and contagious culture so I felt at home in Cuba.

On the one hand, it was the same way of being and on the other one it was as a phenomenon of feedback that completed my education. So the Cuban music and culture found its place in me. The Latin American music is present in my music as is that of the Capeverdean music. In me it is perhaps a little stronger because I’ve been to Cuba and I can translate this through my compositions and way of singing. The cadence the rhythm and so on. And to reinforce that in Simentera some of the others had been in Cuba too.

So the Latin American music enriched my musical feelings and have made me lose all the taboos about singing other people’s music and not feeling guilty I think you understand in what sense I say this. I like to sing the music that I feel strongly and that makes me happy and allows me to transmit a message. It’s why I have in my repertoire both Cuban and Brazilian music.

You are well known as part of the group Simentera. How does having your solo career compare? What are the good things and what things do you miss?
Speaking about Simentera of course I miss them when I play and sing solo (I play percussion also.) They are old friends and I miss them on stage. The empathy, the common feeling, the complicity of doing together something you love and in which you believe. All these years we have been a big family we have been and we are the reference of ours sons and of all one generation. We adore being together, playing and joking and trying to build the future in the way we think we know to do the music.

Cesaria and I have meeting points and differences; we are both from Mindelo; we are both contralto; we sing mornas coladeras in a Barlvento way of singing but of course we have had a very different Parcour and a different way of life

But of course solo I have the freedom to be more expansive more creative in my individuality because I don’t have to respect a common project - I have my own. So they are different things.

There is a clear chemistry on your latest album, Voz, between yourself and Mario Lucio. Tell us about how you worked together on this album.

About my project with Mario, I tell you that 12 years in the same group together makes you know exactly the way of playing on each element. I used to say that Mario Lucio is my twin soul in feeling and in art. With him every performance is easy even when we don’t practice. We can do a concert with our eyes closed because we know what to do in sequence of what each one does. Our language is the music and we know when it has to be calm or strong or in silence. This album comes naturally as a result of so many years working together and satisfying a common feeling about Capeverdean music; beauty, simplicity and naturalness.

Cesaria Evora has clearly opened the door for Capeverdean musicians and placed the islands on the musical map for many outside Africa. Musically, what influences do you think you share and what separates you in your approach to music?

Of course Cesaria and I have meeting points and differences; we are both from Mindelo; we are both contralto; we sing mornas coladeras in a Barlvento way of singing but of course we have had a very different Parcour and a different way of life and this has a strong influence in the way we sing our music. We have had different moments; she is an excellent interpreter: calm, sweet; exactly as she is. I love her authenticity and her honesty as a singer. But I have had the opportunity to intervene in an active way in the Capeverdian music and culture as a composer, as a Simentera member and as a cultural promoter and it gives you another perspective. But I’m sure we both love Capeverdean music we both make it a way of life and I’m happy for her and I have to tell her, thank her for what she is — a very, very great artist.

Is there anything else you would like to add either to your fans or to those who haven’t yet heard your music?
Oh yes I’d like to pass on through my music the message of my islands and my own message. I would hope that people can stop for just a little moment when listening to my music and understand who we are and feel with me what I feel when I sing the nostalgia, the saudade, the sound of the islands, the hope of the rain, the love, the life, the happiness. I think if that happens, then music is really the most universal language for making people closer and happier.

with thanks to John Crosby of PressPromotions and Turid from World Connection for helping us track TÈtÈ down in Senegal