ARUN RATH, HOST:
Betto Arcos is a frequent guest on this program. He's a world music DJ for KPFK, and he travels all over the world in search of cool music. We take full advantage of that here. Betto is just back from Portugal, and he's with us in the studio. Betto, welcome home.
BETTO ARCOS: Oh, it's great to be back here. Thanks for having me.
RATH: Now, if somebody says to me music from Portugal, I immediately think the word fado, and I think of the artist Mariza. But I don't even know how to explain what fado is. I'm going to have you expand my fado horizons. What do you got for us first?
ARCOS: The first voice we want to hear is actually a revelation in terms of voice, in terms of presence in the fado scene. She's not originally from Lisbon, but she is from the north, from Barcelos, the north of Portugal. And her name is Gisela Joao.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MALDICAO")
GISELA JOAO: (Singing in Portuguese).
RATH: So you say that she's not from Lisbon. Tell us about her.
ARCOS: Most people that sing fado are from Lisbon. But in the last decade or more, there's been a lot of different singers coming from different parts of the country. She started singing when she was a teenager. She found herself in the city of Porto singing in a little club there. And someone said, you know, you sound good. Let's give you a place to sing every week. And so she started singing there away from the fado houses. Soon enough, of course, somebody realized, you know, this girl has a career. She moved to Lisbon. She started living in the heart, in the cradle of fado in the neighborhood called Mouraria. And pretty soon, she recorded her first album which is what we're hearing now.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MALDICAO")
JOAO: (Singing in Portuguese).
RATH: That is just beautiful. I'm not going to butcher this name. Will you tell me her name again?
ARCOS: Her name is Gisela Joao, and the song we're hearing is called "Maldicao."
RATH: Love it. So what do you got for us next?
ARCOS: The next singer - I was lucky to go see him perform at one of the dozens of fado houses in Lisbon. His name is Marco Rodrigues, and he's going to sing a song all about a neighborhood, "Bairro Alto," which means high neighborhood or upper neighborhood.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BAIRRO ALTO")
MARCO RODRIGUES: (Singing in Portuguese).
RATH: So Betto, what's he singing about?
ARCOS: He sings about living in the city of Lisbon. Now, I just recently found out that Lisbon has probably the most songs written about the city. It's talking about two specific neighborhoods of Lisbon where you can encounter love if you try hard enough.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BAIRRO ALTO")
RODRIGUES: (Singing in Portuguese).
RATH: So that's Marco Rodrigues.
ARCOS: Marco Rodriguez. And I got to see him in concert at a kind of fado club called Adega Machado, where Amalia Rodrigues, the biggest name in fado, historically, used to sing.
RATH: Wow. I'm speaking with world music DJ Betto Arcos about some of the music he's discovered in Portugal. What else did you find?
ARCOS: Well, this one is actually a tower, a pillar - I should say the most important fado singer today, still alive, Carlos do Carmo.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "FADO E AMOR")
CARLOS DO CARMO: (Singing in Portuguese).
RATH: It's gorgeous. And I feel like I'm hearing some more experience in that voice.
ARCOS: Indeed. In fact, think of him as a sort of Frank Sinatra of fado. This man has been influenced by music from the outside, and at the same time, he helped to kind of open up the world of fado in Portugal. Because it was usually just played on the traditional instruments, the Portuguese guitar and the Spanish guitar. He said, well, fado's more than that. It's not just about, you know, pain and sadness. There's also joy. And there's faster songs. And we can add other instrumentation and even an orchestra. And in the mid-'70s, he did that with a specific album that really kind of opened the door to all of these amazing new voices and fado styles.
RATH: So there's another voice here, a woman. Is that one of those newer voices?
ARCOS: Yes. In fact, Carlos do Carmo, in this particular album, it's kind of an homage to him. He's doing an album of duets, and he invited different new voices of fado. And in this case, this young wonderful singer named Carminho.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "FADO E AMOR")
CARMINHO: (Singing in Portuguese).
RATH: Love it. Betto, we've got time for one more song.
ARCOS: The last thing we're going to hear is the essence of fado. You cannot sing fado, you cannot play fado without the Portuguese guitar. Let's take a listen to Ricardo Parreira and this beautiful tune composed by one of the great composers and guitarists of the Portuguese guitar, Carlos Paredes. The tune is called "Danca Da Aldeia."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DANCA DA ALDEIA")
ARCOS: This young musician, who actually is one of the youngest Portuguese guitar soloists, is absolutely amazing. I got a chance to see him at one of the fantastic fado houses in Lisbon called Maria Severa.
RATH: Betto, how is the Portuguese guitar different from what we think of as a traditional guitar?
ARCOS: Well, originally, they say that the instrument comes from England, that it was called the English guitar. And it came just like they say that the port wine came originally from the influence of the English. It's an instrument that came to Portugal, and it was added as a sort of second voice of the music, of the fado. And so if you ask a Portuguese guitarist, he or she will say - actually I should say he will say, the guitar is meant to accompany the voice and to respond to the voice. So that is the role of that instrument specifically, to dialogue with the fado voice.
RATH: Tell us the name of that guitarist one more time.
ARCOS: His name is Ricardo Parreira.
RATH: That's DJ Betto Arcos. He's the host of Global Village on KPFK here in Los Angeles. If you'd like to take a longer listen to any of the music from Portugal we just played, go to our website nprmusic.org. Betto, always a pleasure, man. Thank you.
ARCOS: My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DANCA DA ALDEIA")