The “Old” and the “New” in Portuguese Music Amália Rodrigues, Fado, and Canto de Intervenção in the Carnation Revolution

Abstract

Since the end of the 1960s, fado and its main interpreter, Amália Rodrigues, have been identified with the political, economic, and cultural backwardness of the Portuguese Estado Novo. On the one hand, the musical genre invited resignation and conformity; on the other, Amália was seen as a supporter and collaborator of the dictatorship of Oliveira Salazar and Marcello Caetano. Replacing fado, a new type of music, known as “intervention song” (canto de intervenção), gained increasing popularity, especially among university youth and opposition segments. This article aims to analyze, on the one hand, the gradual isolation of fado and Amália Rodrigues between the crisis of the Portuguese authoritarian regime and the revolutionary process that followed the coup of 25 April 1974; on the other, the role of “intervention song” as a result of a new aesthetic suited to the values of the revolutionary state.