Born in Lisbon, Portugal, official documents have her date of birth as the 23rd July, but Rodrigues always said her birthday was the 1st July 1920. She was born in the rua Martim Vaz (Martim Vaz Street), freguesia of Pena, Lisbon. Her father was a trumpet player and cobbler from Fundão who returned there when Amália was just over a year old, leaving her to live in Lisbon with her maternal grandmother in a deeply Catholic environment until she was fourteen, when her parents returned to the capital and she moved back in with them.
She was known as the "Rainha do Fado" ("Queen of Fado"), and was most influential in popularising fado worldwide. She was unquestionably the most important figure in the genre’s development, by virtue of an innate interpretive talent carefully nurtured throughout a forty-year recording and stage career. Rodrigues' performances and choice of repertoire pushed fado’s boundaries and helped redefine it and reconfigure it for her and subsequent generations. In effect, Rodrigues wrote the rulebook on what fado could be and on how a female singer - or fadista - should perform it, to the extent that she remains an unsurpassable model and an unending source of repertoire for all those who came afterwards.
After a few years of amateur performances, Rodrigues’ first professional engagement in a fado venue took place in 1939, and she quickly became a regular guest star in stage revues. There she met Frederico Valério, a classically-trained composer who, recognising the potential in such a voice, wrote expansive melodies custom-designed for Rodrigues’ voice, breaking the rules of fado by adding orchestral accompaniment.
Her Portuguese popularity began to extend abroad with trips to Spain, a lengthy stay in Brazil (where, in 1945, she made her first recordings on Brazilian label Continental) and Paris (in 1949). In 1950, while performing at the Marshall Plan international benefit shows, she introduced "April in Portugal" to international audiences (under its original title "Coimbra"). In the early fifties, the patronage of the acclaimed Portuguese poet David Mourão-Ferreira marked the beginning of a new phase; Rodrigues sang many of the country's greatest poets, and some wrote lyrics specifically for her.
In 1954, Rodrigues' international career skyrocketed through her presence in Henri Verneuil’s film The Lovers of Lisbon, where she had a supporting role and performed on-screen. By the late 1950s the USA, England, and France had become her major international markets (Japan and Italy followed in the 1970s); in France especially, her popularity rivalled her Portuguese success, and she graduated to headliner at the prestigious Olympia theatre within a matter of months. Over the years, she performed nearly all over the world, going as far as the Soviet Union and Israel.
At the end of the 1950s, Rodrigues took a year off. She returned in 1962 with a richer voice, concentrating on recording and performing live at a slower pace. Her comeback album, 1962's Amália Rodrigues, was her first collaboration with French composer Alain Oulman, her main songwriter and musical producer throughout the decade. As Valério had before him, Oulman wrote melodies for her that transcended the conventions of fado. Rodrigues did not shy away from controversy: her performance in Carlos Vilardebó’s 1964 arthouse film The Enchanted Islands was better received than the film, based on a short story by Herman Melville, and her 1965 recording of poems by 16th century poet Luís de Camões generated acres of newspaper polemics. Yet her popularity remained untouched. Her 1968 single "Vou Dar de Beber à Dor" broke all sales records, and her 1970 album Com que Voz, considered by many her definitive recording, won a number of international awards.
During the 1970s, Rodrigues concentrated on live work, and embarked upon a heavy schedule of worldwide concert performances. During the frenetic period after the 25th April 1974 she was falsely accused of being a covert agent of the PIDE, causing some trauma to her public life and career. (In fact, during the Salazar years, Rodrigues had been an occasional financial supporter of some communists in need.) Her return to the recording studio in 1977 with Cantigas numa Língua Antiga was received as a triumph. The 1980s and 1990s brought her enthronement as a living legend. Her last all-new studio recording, Lágrima, was released in 1983. It was followed by a series of previously lost or unreleased recordings, and the smash success of two greatest hits collections that sold over 200,000 copies combined.
Despite a series of illnesses involving her voice, Rodrigues continued recording as late as 1990. She eventually retreated from public performance, although her career gained in stature with an official biography by historian and journalist Vítor Pavão dos Santos, and a five-hour television series documenting her fifty-year career, featuring rare archival footage (later distilled into the ninety-minute film documentary, The Art of Amália). Its director, Bruno de Almeida, has also produced Amália, Live in New York City (a concert film of her 1990 performance at New York City Hall).
Rodrigues died on the 6th October 1999 at the age of seventy-nine in her home in Lisbon. Portugal's government promptly declared a period of national mourning. Her house (in Rua de São Bento) is now a museum. She is now buried at the National Pantheon alongside other Portuguese notables.
1946.
Alfama
Amália Rodrigues Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Como um veleiro sem velas
Alfama toda parece
Uma casa sem janelas
Aonde o povo arrefece
É numa água-furtada
No espaço roubado à mágoa
Em quatro paredes de água
Quatro paredes de pranto
Quatro muros de ansiedade
Que à noite fazem o canto
Que se acende na cidade
Fechada em seu desencanto
Alfama cheira a saudade
Alfama não cheira a fado
Cheira a povo, a solidão,
Cheira a silêncio magoado
Sabe a tristeza com pão
Alfama não cheira a fado
Mas não tem outra canção.
The lyrics of Amalia Rodrigues's song Alfama describe the Lisbon neighborhood of Alfama at night. It begins with the comparison of Alfama to a sailboat without sails, as if the neighborhood has lost its energy and direction. The houses are described as being without windows, and the people are becoming cold. The singer then focuses on a specific attic room where Alfama seems to be closed in and surrounded by walls of water and tears, representing the emotions and sadness of the people who live there. The walls are described as being full of anxiety, but also full of a song that is sparked at night and illuminates the city in the midst of its despair.
The lyrics then go on to describe the neighborhood's scent and what it represents. Alfama is not described as smelling of Fado, a famous style of Portuguese singing that is often associated with the area, but rather of the people's loneliness, of the sadness that is carried as a burden, and of the resilience of spirit that continues on with the offering and sharing of bread. The song concludes by stating that even though Alfama does not smell of Fado, it is the only song that truly represents the neighborhood, its people, its struggles, and its beauty.
Overall, the song has a melancholic and reflective tone that speaks of the realities of life in Alfama, while also paying tribute to the neighborhood and its people's resilience for surviving and moving forward.
Line by Line Meaning
Quando Lisboa anoitece
As the night falls in Lisbon
Como um veleiro sem velas
Like a sailboat without sails
Alfama toda parece
Alfama appears
Uma casa sem janelas
Like a house with no windows
Aonde o povo arrefece
Where the people cool down
É numa água-furtada
It's in an attic
No espaço roubado à mágoa
In the space stolen from sorrow
Que Alfama fica fechada
That Alfama is closed
Em quatro paredes de água
In four walls of water
Quatro paredes de pranto
Four walls of tears
Quatro muros de ansiedade
Four walls of anxiety
Que à noite fazem o canto
That at night sing
Que se acende na cidade
That lights up the city
Fechada em seu desencanto
Closed in its disillusionment
Alfama cheira a saudade
Alfama smells like nostalgia
Alfama não cheira a fado
Alfama doesn't smell like fado
Cheira a povo, a solidão,
It smells like people, loneliness,
Cheira a silêncio magoado
It smells like hurt silence
Sabe a tristeza com pão
It tastes like sadness with bread
Mas não tem outra canção.
But it doesn't have another song.
Contributed by Liliana D. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
@MrTavares67
Quando a Lisbona si fa notte
Come un veliero senza vele
Alfama tutta pare
Una casa senza finestre
Dove la gente ha freddo
È in una stretta mansarda
Nello spazio rubato all’amarezza
Che Alfama è chiusa
In quattro pareti di acqua
Quattro pareti di pianto
Quattro muri di ansietà
Che la notte fanno un canto
Che si accende nella città
Chiusa nel suo disincanto
Alfama odora di nostalgia
Alfama non odora di fado
Odora di gente, di solitudine
Odora di silenzio amareggiato
Conosce pane e tristezza
Alfama non odora di fado
Ma non ha altro canto.
@lucasnepomuceno2436
Quando Lisboa anoitece
Como um veleiro sem velas
Alfama toda parece
Uma casa sem janelas
Aonde o povo arrefece
É numa água-furtada
No espaço roubado à mágoa
Que Alfama fica fechada
Em quatro paredes d'água
Quatro paredes de pranto
Quatro muros de ansiedade
Que à noite fazem o canto
Que se acende na cidade
Fechada em seu desencanto
Alfama cheira a saudade
Alfama não cheira a fado
Cheira a povo, a solidão
Cheira a silêncio magoado
Sabe a tristeza com pão
Alfama não cheira a fado
Mas não tem outra canção
Alfama não cheira a fado
Mas não tem outra canção
@MrTavares67
Quand à Lisbonne se fait nuit
comme un voilier sans voiles,
toute l’Alfama ressemble
à une maison sans fenêtres,
où le peuple souffre de froid.
C’est dans une mansarde,
dans l’espace volée à la douleur
qu’Alfama reste enfermée
entre quatre parois d’eau,
quatre parois de pleur,
quatre murs d’anxiété
qui de nuit font un chant
qui s’allume dans la ville.
Fermée dans sa déception,
Alfama sent de nostalgie.
Alfama ne sent pas de fado;
sent de peuple, de solitude,
d’un silence douloureux,
a le goût de tristesse et de pain.
Alfama ne sent pas de fado
mais n’a pas d’autre chanson.
@mvmcampos
Para todos os que amam Lisboa...que amam Amália, o Fado de Lisboa...que sentem Portugal...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
QUANDO LISBOA ANOITECE
Quando Lisboa anoitece
Como um veleiro sem velas
Alfama toda parece
Uma casa sem janelas
Aonde o povo arrefece
É numa água-furtada
No espaço roubado à mágoa
Que Alfama fica fechada
Em quatro paredes de água
Quatro paredes de pranto
Quatro muros de ansiedade
Que à noite fazem o canto
Que se acende na cidade
Fechada em seu desencanto
Alfama cheira a saudade
Alfama não cheira a fado
Cheira a povo, a solidão
Cheira a silêncio magoado
Sabe a tristeza com pão
Alfama não cheira a fado
Mas não tem outra canção
Alfama não cheira a fado
Mas não tem outra canção
Fonte: Musixmatch
Abraços 🎼🎶💗🇵🇹🌹
@alexandredefreitas7611
LYRICS - PAROLES - LETRA
Quando Lisboa anoitece
Como um veleiro sem velas
Alfama toda parece
Uma casa sem janelas
Aonde o povo arrefece
É numa água-furtada
No espaço roubado à mágoa
Que Alfama fica fechada
Em quatro paredes de água
Quatro paredes de pranto
Quatro muros de ansiedade
Que à noite fazem o canto
Que se acende na cidade
Fechada em seu desencanto
Alfama cheira a saudade
Alfama não cheira a fado
Cheira a povo, a solidão
Cheira a silêncio magoado
Sabe a tristeza com pão
Alfama não cheira a fado
Mas não tem outra canção
Alfama não cheira a fado
Mas não tem outra canção
@auramartins2941
Diva! Uma voz de outro mundo que ninguém ainda superou Amália é o fado e o fado é Amália
@taniaalbuquerque1219
Toca a minha alma de saudade..Qta riqueza! Os fados trazem Portugal a mim.
@miguelalves3278
Não há música mais bela que a nossa!! 🇵🇹 VIVA A AMÁLIA!! VIVA O FADO!! VIVA A LÍNGUA PORTUGUESA E VIVA OS PORTUGUESES. ORGULHO EM TER NASCIDO NESTE PAÍS PEQUENO MAS GRANDE ❤️🇵🇹
@francescomazzella5940
Non comprendo una parola, ma una voce che arriva diritto al cuore, e ti riempie gli occhi di lacrime, e non sai perche'...
@MrTavares67
Quando a Lisbona si fa notte
Come un veliero senza vele
Alfama tutta pare
Una casa senza finestre
Dove la gente ha freddo
È in una stretta mansarda
Nello spazio rubato all’amarezza
Che Alfama è chiusa
In quattro pareti di acqua
Quattro pareti di pianto
Quattro muri di ansietà
Che la notte fanno un canto
Che si accende nella città
Chiusa nel suo disincanto
Alfama odora di nostalgia
Alfama non odora di fado
Odora di gente, di solitudine
Odora di silenzio amareggiato
Conosce pane e tristezza
Alfama non odora di fado
Ma non ha altro canto.
@francescomazzella5940
@@MrTavares67 obregado!
@francescomazzella5940
@@MrTavares67 un testo degno di Pessoa o Camoes...
@lucasnepomuceno2436
Essa canção toca a alma. Sou brasileiro e amo escutar fado, especialmente na voz de Amália Rodrigues.
@brunotupi83br
Mulher maravilhosa! Choro cada vez que escuto suas canções magoadas e sinto um imenso orgulho de falar a língua portuguesa na alma. Abraços a todos do Brasil.
@lusagal8591
a nossa lingua é rica em palavras e em sentimentos abraço de Portugal