ARTIST: Claudia Aurora
COUNTRY: Portugal
GENRE: Fado
ABOUT: With a following to rival flamenco, the haunting melodies of Portuguese fado have always held listeners spellbound; Claudia Aurora is its powerful new voice. Claudia Aurora sings fado – traditional Portuguese folk-blues – like no one else. The singer-songwriter’s debut album, “Silêncio” (released in the UK by World Village/Harmonia Mundi on 31 October 2011), is the first collection of original fado songs to be recorded in the UK since the great Portuguese Fado diva Amália Rodrigues recorded at Abbey Road Studios in 1952.
Claudia Aurora is a fadista and songwriter from Oporto, Portugal. She is based in Bristol, UK since 2003 and has built a reputation as a stunning live performer. Claudia has sung fado at numerous venues in the UK, including the prestigious Kings Place, Queen Elizabeth Hall (Southbank Centre), Momo and Heaven, in London, Royal Theatre in Norwich, and St George’s in Bristol. Her shows have been recorded and broadcasted by BBC Radio 3.
“Silêncio” is a showcase of both her powerful voice and her unique original songs. The first fados to be written in the UK, these songs deal with the traditional Fado themes of life, destiny, longing and despair.
MORE ABOUT: Claudia Aurora sings fado – traditional Portuguese folk-blues – like no one else. We shouldn’t, perhaps, be surprised. After all, she enjoyed a thoroughly modern musical upbringing in the tiny village just outside Porto that was her childhood home, with fado only coming to the fore once she’d struck out for the UK and settled in Bristol.
It was here, in a city already famed for musicians blending old ingredients into something wholly new, that past and present combined to give a taste of the future. The being raised on a diet of early Bruce Springsteen, Led Zeppelin, Neil Young and Diamond (when Claudia first realised she could sing – really sing – it was to a Janis Joplin song). The late teens love of Brazilian music, be it bossa nova or MPB (Musica Popular Brasileira, an umbrella term for everything that came after bossa nova), and singers like Elis Regina and Maria Bethania, songwriters such as Chico Buarque, Vinicius De Morais or Milton Nascimento.
And then Claudia’s move, to a place far from friends and family, quite naturally unlocked a musical form renowned for its heady mix of loss, longing, love, and nostalgia: fado. Suddenly, she found herself singing the songs sung by her grandmother, a chef who would sing fado come sundown, and the woman from whom Claudia – real surname Silva – takes her stage name. Music is also in the blood of her singer/actor father, and her uncle. She was, she says, destined to sing. And, while also taking inspiration from homeland singer-songwriters like Zeca Afonso, Dulce Pontes and the great Amália Rodrigues, that’s precisely what she’s done ever since moving to England.
Eight years later, it is time for the rest of the world to hear Bristol’s secret. It is time for “Silêncio”. Welcome to the sound of “Silêncio”. A groundbreaking sound. The sound of the first collection of original fado songs ever written in the UK.
SELECTED PRESS REVIEWS AND QUOTES:
“A beguiling voice! And her instrumentalists are superb!” (Michael Church, The Scotsman, UK)
“As she projected her voice across the audience you could feel the power and soul in the performance; this gave me goose bumps, and made me feel at ease and memorised by her beautiful voice.” (Jonathan Frost, Norwich Evening News, UK)
“Mayra Andrade and Claudia Aurora are the most amazing singers I have ever heard and I will never forget them.” (Jonathan Frost, Norwich Evening News, UK)
“2011, deservedly, has been a heck of a year for Claudia Aurora and on tonight’s showing – one of the most sexy, sensual, affecting and accomplished to fill the Folk House for some time – 2012 should see her fly. Truly, Silêncio is golden.” (Joe Spurgeon, Venue Magazine, UK)
“It virtually defies belief: many are the times we’ve marvelled at Claudia Aurora’s darkly beautiful fado performances, but with new band in town – in particular the hummingbird shimmer of Bernardo Couto’s Portuguese guitar – she’s somehow raised her game to a whole new level. The centre of the drama, of course, remains that extraordinary voice, and its unerring ability to offer deepest felt emotion the clearest possible expression. Truly, this is an exquisite melancholy, as both the watery eyes of many in the crowd – and their thunderous standing ovation come curtain down – attest.” (Julian Owen, UK)
“Amazing performance… very moving.” (Andy Pryor, UK)
“Claudia, I LOVED your performance! Your voice is incredible!! I felt so involved with the performance, it is so emotional.” (Katie Goldsmith, UK)
“Thank you for an amazing gig yesterday! I was totally blown away!! You have such an amazing voice.” (Gnisha Bevan, UK)
“Emotionally intense and captivating fado” (Musicport World Music Festival, UK)
“I think we can safely say that the women won this year with amazing performances by Mercedes Peon, Mari Boine, Claudia Aurora, Natalie Duncan, Cigdem Aslan, Kim Richey & Mary Coughlan in particular.” (Musicport World Music Festival, UK)
“Just to say thank you. The gig in Colchester last week was amazing & my Portuguese girlfriend loved it having not seen fado live since she left Lisbon 21 years ago.” (Gareth Gault, UK)
“There are hundreds upon hundreds of acts in the BrisBath area alone, but you should definitely mark your card to check the following. Claudia Aurora is the country’s premier exponent of fado (Portuguese Blues) and, when she is not wowing the London’s Southbank, still regularly plays in the area where it all began.” (Venue Magazine, UK)
“Silencio is breathtaking. There is just something soooo….wonderful about this artist’s voice. Pls check her music out :)” (Coral Rose, UK)
“Amazing and totally awesome performance at Musicport Festival, Bridlington. Such a pleasure to meet and interview a wonderfully talented artist such as yourself. Thank you for your new album, Silencio is superb!” (Coral Rose, UK)
“@MusicportFest Tough to answer as @THEAndyKershaw @ClaudiaAuroraPT @mercedespeon @asere @changinghorses plus many more made it superb!” (Coral Rose tweeting about Claudia Aurora performance at Musicport Festival, UK)
“Yesterdays highights for me @MusicportFest @mercedespeon @claudiaauroraPT legendary @THEAndyKershaw x @changinghorses and ASERE!!” (Coral Rose tweeting about Claudia Aurora performance at Musicport Festival, UK)
“Fantastic set by @ClaudiaAuroraPT at #musicport festival – CDs sold out too!” (Songlines tweeting about Claudia Aurora performance at Musicport Festival, UK)
“Be enchanted by the beautiful and talented @ClaudiaAuroraPT performing @MusicportFest this weekend. Muchas gracias guapa!” (Coral Rose tweeting about Claudia Aurora performance at Musicport Festival, UK)
“Haunting Portuguese fado from this rising star of the scene here performing heartbreakingly poignant material from her widely acclaimed 2011 album ‘Silêncio’” (Time Out)
“I love this album by Claudia Aurora. Exquisitely simple and uniquely traditional – unadorned music at its best. Silêncio is mood music personified, embracing the classical fado themes of loss and yearning. Her deeply expressive voice is a joy to listen to.” (Liz MacIntosh, Festival Previews)
“She has a beautiful voice and her album is excellent” (Elizabeth MacIntosh, Festival Previews)
“Spine-tingling” (Alex Denney, NME)
“A finely judged and superbly executed programme” (Gordon Turner, Norwich)
“She is really amazing – one of my highlights of the year” (Viktor Wynd, The Last Tuesday Society)
“Drenched in emotion and drama” (Lucy Duran, BBC Radio 3)
“Boy, she has a voice, as elementally strong as the tides of which she sings, and as imbued with ability to induce calm and awe.” (Venue Magazine)
“Porto-born singer/songwriter Claudia Aurora enraptures with the spine-tingling emotion of her powerful, mournful Fado torch songs. Her extraordinary voice, drenched in a sadness that courses through the audience, gives the soaring sound of Portugal unique dramatic expression.” (St. George’s Bristol)
SELECTED DISCOGRAPHY:
- “Silêncio” (World Village/Harmonia Mundi, 2011)
SELECTED VIDEOS:
Claudia Aurora: “Silencio”
SELECTED PERFORMANCES:
2011
25 NOV: Folk House, Bristol, UK
19 NOV: Diss Corn Hall, Diss, UK
18 NOV: Colchester Arts Centre, Colchester, UK
12 NOV: Hawth Theatre, Crawley, UK
05 NOV: Musicport Festival, Bridlington, UK
02 NOV: London International Festival of Exploratory Music (LIFEM), London, UK
16 SEP: Varna Theatre, Varna, Bulgaria
12 AUG: Iford Arts, Bradford-on-Avon, UK
31 JUL: Harbour Festival, Bristol, UK
16 JUL: Melt Festival, Gräfenhainichen, Germany (as a guest of These New Puritans)
15 JUL: private event, Berlin, Germany (as a guest of These New Puritans)
08 JUL: La Machine du Moulin Rouge, Paris, France (as a guest of These New Puritans)
27 MAY: Brighton Fringe Festival, Brighton, UK
18 MAY: Heaven, London, UK (as a guest of These New Puritans)
15 MAY: Norfolk & Norwich Festival, Norwich, UK
02 APR: The Last Tuesday Society, London, UK
12 MAR: Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, UK
01 MAR: Momo, London, UK
2010
09 DEC: The Magpie’s Nest, London, UK
04 DEC: Folk House, Bristol, UK
14 NOV: Valerie Bowes Art Exhibition, Bristol, UK
19 OCT: Colston Hall, Bristol, UK
10 JUN: Metropolis (Old Jesters), Bristol, UK
SONGS:
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