With regard to the life and music of Cristina Branco, one could say – as in the lyric by Amália Rodrigues – that she lives and breathes fado.
From fado, we tend to expect an emphasis on the tragic aspects of life: on suffering, longing and the helplessness we experience when confronted by destiny. This long-held tradition has created ‘formulas’ to express such feelings, but their repetition has had the effect of diminishing the power of this valuable musical form, of emptying it of emotion, of distancing it from the lyrics.
Cristina Branco has taken another road, however, one of individuality and singularity, and often one of ecstatic joy (as in the most emblematic song of her career, ‘Sete Pedaços de Vento’ (‘Seven Fragments of the Wind’), from Ulisses (Ulysses). In so doing, she has sometimes caused the pillars of so-called traditional fado to tremble. At the very least, Cristina’s musical journey is infused with a sensuousness evidencing her weariness with what has come before.
Without seeking any sort of naive break with tradition, she instead searches for what is best in this tradition (listen to some of the classic songs that she has recorded). Cristina Branco gives new life to this tradition with her originality. And in all her records, she has sought to create a fruitful relationship between the lyrics and the innate musicality of fado.
Cristina Branco creates all the emotion that this musical style – with its intimate relationship between voice, poetry and music – has to offer. Along with other young musicians who, since the mid-1990s, have found in fado their own way of expressing themselves (thereby contributing to an astonishing reinvigoration of the traditional song form of Lisbon), Cristina Branco has begun to define her own journey, in which respect for tradition walks hand in hand with a desire for innovation. Even if nothing in her early life indicated that Cristina’s destiny was in fado, it is clear today that she has created a style that is unprecedented and very possibly unique.
ARR: Dokkhuset Scene
