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Folk Alliance International Announces Portugal As Country Focus At The 37th Annual Conference Portuguese Artists Among 175+ Performers From 38 Countries Of Origin For 37th Annual Conference In Montreal, Qc Feb. 19-23, 2025
October 17, 2024
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FOLK ALLIANCE INTERNATIONAL ANNOUNCES PORTUGAL AS COUNTRY FOCUS AT THE 37TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE
PORTUGUESE ARTISTS AMONG 175+ PERFORMERS FROM 38 COUNTRIES OF ORIGIN FOR 37TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE IN MONTREAL, QC FEB. 19-23, 2025
Kansas City, Mo. and Lisbon, Portugal (October 17, 2024) – Folk Alliance International (FAI) – the leading and largest nonprofit dedicated to serving, strengthening, and engaging the global folk music community through preservation, promotion, and presentation – named its Country Focus for FAI’s 2025 conference as Portugal, presented in partnership with Why Portugal based in Lisbon.
Celebrating exemplary regions where folk music is incubated and exported at the highest level, FAI selected Portugal for this country focus because of the rich and diverse folk music that famously includes Fado but reaches far beyond into many unique, regional traditions. Working with Why Portugal, FAI will present a deeper look at some of those traditions as they are practiced by great contemporary artists, with six official artist showcases plus a panel on Portuguese regional folk chordophone instruments and private showcases from an additional four artists from Portugal.
Photos of artists performing: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1LmFRVBzOul54XPY49DWtuD0stag9_zz-?usp=sharing
Official Showcase Acts include:
- Retimbrar - Based in Porto, this 8-piece collective creates beats and songs, made new - deeply rooted in the diversity of national folklore, popular poetry and orality, chanting and percussive elements.
- Lusitanian Ghosts - Portuguese-Swedish Chordophone Collective, Lusitanian Ghosts use ancient Portuguese folk instruments, the Violas Amarantina, Braguesa, Campaniça, Terceira, to write contemporary songs written from a humanist singer-songwriter perspective.
- OMIRI - A compellingly original artist, OMIRI takes samples of traditional songs and original video footage, and performs by mixing the sound and video of said performances. These performances are transfixing and mix already-forgotten musical practices, making them permeable and accessible to the culture of our day, synchronizing forms and music of Portuguese rural tradition with the language of the urban culture.
- Joana Alegre - Having studied classical music and jazz in Portugal, the United States, and Italy, Joane Alegre has built a strong career including singing on Portugal’s The Voice and semi-finalist status in the International Song Contest. She is currently promoting her third studio album ''LUAS'', featuring the singles 'Nó', 'Ciclotímica',- nominated for "Song Of The Year" 2023 at the International Portuguese Music Award, 'Rosa Carne', ‘Copo Cheio’, ‘Lógica Astral’ and ‘Desdita’, with a baroque pop and electronic sound, mixing her Portuguese roots with dreamlike epic spaces and atmospheres.
- João Diogo Leitão - "por onde fica a primavera"- Guitarist and composer, João Diogo Leitão challenges tradition and aesthetic barriers through an innovative approach to one of the most fascinating traditional Portuguese instruments, the “viola braguesa.” The resulting music is haunting and exists in a genre somewhere between folk music and atmospheric classical expressions.
- Marta Pereira da Costa - Fado guitar virtuoso Marta Pereira da Costa’s introduction to the Portuguese guitar came through Carlos Gonçalves, guitarist for Amália Rodrigues. A storied career has followed including a key role in"A Música e a Guitarra - Clube de Fado," (Best Album of 2005 by Songlines magazine), global tours, and NPR’s prestigious Tiny Desk Concert.
Longer artist bios below.
Portugal’s private showcases will feature a WHY Portugal room as well as a Lusitanian / Mais 5 label room, featuring the six official showcase artists plus another four private showcase artists:
RAIA - António Bexiga aka RAIA is a one-man exploration machine with the Viola Campaniça as his compass and lots of friends along for the ride. Interested in the spaces in-between, the RAIA countryside between Portugal, Spain and beyond…
O Gajo - João Morais aka O Gajo, or “the dude”, is re-inventing the Viola Campaniça for a new generation of musical experimentation that comes from a folk-punk approach to tradition.
Lavoisier - Lavoisier is a Portuguese Folk duo influenced by the whole world of sensations that music can bring along, and while sharing the same spirit of the Tropicalistas, Michel Giacometti and Fernando Lopes Graça, they head towards their own musical expression, with no fears and no preconceptions about anything. All that and a great passion of the songs of José Afonso, as witnessed via their participation in the Wanderer Songs collective.
PS Lucas - Singer, songwriter, guitarist, producer and avid student of folk music traditions, PS Lucas has been refining the art of making songs for some time, from electro-folklore extravaganza O Experimentar to being the younger half of the Medeiros / Lucas duo and now a key member of the Wanderer Songs collective.
The Mais 5 showcase room will also feature the music of Portugal’s renowned singer-songwriter José Afonso and the vinyl LP re-issues of his recorded works on the Mais 5 label. There will also be information about the Wanderer Songs project including a documentary and concert film from the residency in the Açores in April 2024, that celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Carnation Revolution.
In addition, there will be a panel entitled “Lusitanian Chordophones: Portuguese folk traditions on the brink of extinction.” The violas Amarantina, Beiroa, Braguesa, Campaniça, Terceira and Toeira have different strings, and different tunings, and tell the history – and the quasi-disappearance – of Portuguese folk music. It will be moderated by Nuno Saraiva (Lusitanian Music Publishing) with panelists to include Vasco Ribeiro Casais (OMIRI), António Bexiga (RAIA), Marta Pereira da Costa, and João Morais (O Gajo).
FAI previously unveiled the lineup of Official Showcases for its thirty-seventh annual conference, to be held February 19-23, 2025, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The over one hundred and seventy-five artists represent thirty-eight countries of origin, nineteen U.S. states, and all thirteen Canadian provinces, one of the larger slates of showcases in the conference’s history. The complete Official Showcase Artist lineup: https://www.folk.org/conference/2025-official-showcase-artists
Jennifer Roe, Executive Director at Folk Alliance International says, “This is an exciting time to highlight Portugal’s folk music, which has not gotten much attention in North America. Coming into Canada this year is an ideal setting to introduce these incredible artists and traditions because of the strong Portuguese communities in Montréal, Toronto, and across Canada and the USA. We could not be more thrilled to present these world-class acts within our event.”
Nuno Saraiva, International Coordinator of WHY Portugal says, “The Folk Alliance International conference is the perfect event to showcase not just the roots of Portuguese Folk, but also the innovative way through which present-day artists from Portugal - and beyond - are using traditional Portuguese folk instruments and traditions in creative new ways, making forward-looking music building on tradition! We are very happy at this opportunity to bring these 10 Portuguese artists to North America via the 2025 Country Focus Portugal.”
This country focus mission has the support of Dgartes and Fundação GDA via its International Showcase Program.
WHY Portugal is supported by Fundação GDA and Audiogest.
About WHY Portugal
Portugal is perhaps best known for its traditional Fado music, however it is a country that is rich in Folk music traditions with unique instruments to show for it. Ethnomusicologists point to the way the Portuguese Cavaquinho traveled the world to become the Ukelele, in Hawaii; but other traditional chordophones never left home: the regional popular violas (the Amarantina, Beiroa, Braguesa, Campaniça, Terceira and Toeira) are virtually unknown outside Portugal and some of them even came close to extinction in Portugal. Fortunately, a crop of new artists are rediscovering these instruments.
WHY Portugal is Portugal’s music industry export office, supported by the neighboring rights societies Audiogest and Fundação GDA. Founded in 2016, it has previously led Portugal Country Focus missions to Eurosonic ESNS, Waves Vienna, and also showcases Portuguese artists at Focus Wales, The Great Escape, SXSW and other events.
Learn more: https://whyportugal.org/
About Folk Alliance International
Founded in 1989, and governed by a 21-member board of directors, Folk Alliance International (FAI) is the world’s largest membership organization for the folk music industry and community. Its mission is to serve, strengthen, and engage the global folk music community through preservation, presentation, and promotion.
FAI values diversity, equity, inclusion, and access, is committed to gender parity in all its programming, celebrates multiple languages and cultures, and actively welcomes participation from marginalized, disenfranchised, and underrepresented communities.
FAI defines folk broadly as “the music of the people” (reflective of any community they are from), and programs a diverse array of sub-genres including, but not limited to Appalachian, Americana, Blues, Bluegrass, Celtic, Cajun, Global Roots, Hip-Hop, Old-Time, Singer-Songwriter, Spoken Word, Traditional, Zydeco, and various fusions.
FAI produces the International Folk Music Awards (IFMAs), an Artist in Residence (AIR) program, The Folk ExChange global market development program, the Ethno USA gathering, and the world’s largest annual folk music conference (drawing 3,332 delegates from 41 countries in January 2020).
Additionally, FAI provides advocacy, education, and professional development for over 4,000 members, and oversees an IRS Group Exemption program in support of over 50 US non-profits.
Learn more: https://www.folk.org
More about the Artists
Joana Alegre
Joana Alegre is a singer-songwriter with classical and jazz training in Portugal, United States and Italy. She did her live debut with a show of her own songs at the legendary American concert hall The Shrine. The Portuguese audience first felt in love with her voice in 2014, when 'E Agora?', a duet with Mikkel Solnado, was released. He then produced her debut album, “Joan & The White Harts”, which was a semifinalist in the 2016 and 2019 International Songwriting Contest. In 2019/2020 she was a contestant in The Voice Portugal and ended the talent competition in 3rd place. In 2021 she was a finalist at Festival da Canção with 'Joana do Mar', a track Joana Alegre wrote herself. In the same year, she released her acclaimed sophomore studio effort, "Centro", produced by Luísa Sobral and chosen by Blitz magazine as one of the best records released in 2021. Around this time, she curated “Um Só Dia” project, a tribute to the poetry of her father Manuel Alegre, a live show now available in both physical and digital album formats. In 2022-23, she toured Portugal, performing over 30 shows. In March 2024 she released her 3rd studio album ''LUAS'', featuring the singles 'Nó', 'Ciclotímica',- nominated for "Song Of The Year" 2023 at the IMPA - International Portuguese Music Awards -, 'Rosa Carne', ‘Copo Cheio’ , ‘Lógica Astral’ and ‘Desdita’, with a more baroque pop and electronic sound, mixing her portuguese roots with dreamlike epic spaces and atmospheres.
João Diogo Leitão - "por onde fica a primavera"
Guitarist and composer, João Diogo Leitão challenges tradition and aesthetic barriers through an innovative approach to one of the most fascinating traditional Portuguese instruments, the “viola braguesa”. "“...this is viola braguesa as we never heard it before. A brave record that unfolds new frontiers for a discreet but charming instrument.” – Songlines (UK)
Lusitanian Ghosts
Portuguese-Swedish Chordophone Collective, Lusitanian Ghosts use ancient Portuguese folk instruments, the Violas Amarantina, Braguesa, Campaniça, Terceira, to write contemporary songs written from a humanist singer-songwriter perspective. Founded by Portuguese-Canadian singer-songwriter Neil Leyton along with Swedish singer-songwriter Mikael Lundin aka Micke Ghost, Lusitanian Ghosts also feature João Sousa on drums, Janne Olson on bass, and chordophone players ToZé Bexiga on the Campaniça and Abel Beja on the Terceira.
OMIRI
OMIRI is one of the most original projects to reinvent Portuguese music.
To reinvent tradition, nothing better than bringing the real players of Portuguese culture to the show itself; musicians and soundscapes from all over Portugal playing and singing as if they were part of the same universe. Not in flesh and blood but in sound and image, with video field recordings manipulated in order to serve as a musical base for Vasco Ribeiro Casais's composition and improvisation.
OMIRI is, above all, remix, the culture of the 21st century, mixing in one show already forgotten musical practices, making them permeable and accessible to the culture of our day, synchronising forms and music of Portuguese rural tradition with the language of the urban culture.
Retimbrar
RETIMBRAR is a vigorous movement performed by an 8-piece collective, based in Porto.
Inspired by the country's musical traditions, TugaBeat is the name they give to their sound - Portuguese beats and songs, made new. Deeply rooted in the diversity of national folklore, popular poetry and orality, chanting and percussive elements.
Marta Pereira da Costa
Marta Pereira da Costa, born in Lisbon in 1982, immersed herself in music early on, beginning piano lessons at age four and adding classical guitar at eight. Her introduction to the Portuguese guitar came at 18 through Carlos Gonçalves, guitarist for Amália Rodrigues, while pursuing Civil Engineering studies. Balancing her education with her burgeoning passion for fado at Lisbon's Clube de Fado, Marta's journey unfolded, marked by collaborations with influential guitarists and a pivotal role in ""A Música e a Guitarra - Clube de Fado,"" celebrated as Best Album of 2005 by Songlines magazine.
Transitioning from engineering to music, Marta collaborated with Jaime Roldán and Rodrigo Costa Félix before her solo debut in Toronto. Her career soared across continents, from prestigious venues in Portugal like Centro Cultural de Belém to international stages in Brazil, Switzerland, and the USA, including acclaimed appearances at SXSW and NPR Music’s Tiny Desk.
Her debut album in 2016, produced by Filipe Raposo, showcased her versatility with guests like Camané and Richard Bona, blending fado with jazz and world music. Marta's career flourished with extensive tours and collaborations, culminating in her upcoming second album, ""Sem Palavras,"" in collaboration with Iván Melón Lewis, set to launch in May 2024.
With a global tour spanning Australia, India, and beyond, Marta continues to push boundaries, recently performing with the Chinese Orchestra of Macau. Her artistic journey, marked by passion and innovation, affirms her commitment to elevating the Portuguese guitar on the world stage."
To learn more, please contact Nick Loss-Eaton at nick.losseaton@gmail.com or 718-541-1130 or, if you’re in Canada, Jeremy Spellanzon at jspellanzon@me.com.
