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Katia Guerreiro - Fado

Born in South Africa, a doctor by profession, and former lead singer of a rock band, Katia Guerreiro has perhaps taken a slightly different route to Fadista stardom.

Katia Guerreiro - Fado

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But the real deal she is - twice nominated for the José Afonso Prize - and on Fado she continues to shine as one of the leading lights of Europe’s Fado revival.

This record is Guerreiro’s fourth and she presents an array of standards (except for the lilting ‘A Viz da Poesia’ which Guerreiro penned with Rui Veloso), accompanied by Portuguese guitar, guitar and bass. What Guerreiro sings and who she sings with though doesn’t seem important; it is her remarkable voice that sits centre-stage.

Powerfully raw and impervious to any restraint, Guerreiro’s voice is wonderfully old-fashioned. She sings mournful lyrics with clear vocal lines that are interrupted by full-throated ornamentation and vibrato, all delivered without due care to the odd strained chord or sharp note. This, added to her musicianship - pulling around the tempo of the songs as she pleases - gives Fado the air of an up-close live performance. Close your eyes and it is not hard to imagine sitting in an intimate Lisbon restaurant. Clever production does not get in the way of the soul of this music.

Ballads are the best vehicle for Guerreiro’s mezzo-soprano and the slower numbers give her voice chance to build in intensity - final track ‘Eu Queria Cantar-te Um Fado’ being a good example. Fado is not all sun-drenched sorrow though and Guerreiro is capable of a light touch too as she demonstrates on the slinkier numbers. ‘A Voz da Poesia’ and ‘Poema da Malta das Naus’ are both effortlessly elegant, with Paolo Valentin’s Portuguese guitar dexterously duetting with Guerreiro.

An album of simplicity and pure class.



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