The Portuguese singer who had campaigned for the recognition of this music died in Lisbon on January 1, at the age of 81.
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He was one of the references of fado, the emblematic urban popular song of Portugal and the song of the soul of Lisbon, its capital. The hometown of Carlos do Carmo had also dedicated an exhibition to him in 2014, to celebrate his 50 years of career. This adored veteran of modern fado was an example and a precursor for many fadists of the following generations, such as Camané, Mariza, Cristina Branco, Ana Moura, Carminho …, anxious to give new vigor to fado, without denying its fundamentals . Carlos do Carmo died in Lisbon, Friday January 1 st , of an aneurysm, at the Santa Maria hospital, at the age of 81.
The announcement of his death attracted numerous tributes from the music scene and from Portuguese personalities, including the President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa. Monday January 4 was declared a day of national mourning. According to the Portuguese press, the government also proposed to the President of the Republic the posthumous attribution of the Order of Liberty, “because of the decisive role played by Carlos do Carmo in the renewal of fado”.
Carlos do Carmo was born on December 21, 1939, in Lisbon, to a famous fado singer, Lucilia do Carmo (1919-1998), and a bookseller father, who in 1948 opened a fado house under the name from Adega da Lucilia (“Lucilia’s Cellar”), later renamed O Faia, located Rua da Barroca, in Bairro Alto, overlooking the Tagus. After the death of his father in 1962, Carlos do Carmo returned from Switzerland, where his parents had sent him at the age of 15 for his studies, and took over the management of the place. He made his debut there as a fado singer, then serious, over the 1960s, his first records, including Estranha Forma de Vida, recorded in 1964 with orchestra, a fado created by the icon of the genre Amalia Rodrigues (1920-1999 ), to music by Alfredo Marceneiro (1891-1982), which appeared on the Alvorada label, and the album O Fado Em Duas Gerações, recorded with his mother, Lucilia, released in 1969 by Decca. International career
In Portugal, he quickly became a popular and honored singer. Long close to the Communist Party, the singer strives to demonstrate that there is no complicity between fado and dictatorship – opponents of the Salazarist regime (1933-1974) indeed denounced the three “f”, fado, football and Fatima, as the “opium of the people”, according to the Portuguese intelligentsia. With the years 1970, begins his international career and the first tours. Carlos do Carmo sings in particular in Angola, the United States, Canada. In Brazil, where his mother had lived for several years before returning to Lisbon to open his fado house, he performed alongside Elis Regina, at the Copacabana Palace, in Rio de Janeiro, where he received the title of citizen of honor in 1987.
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