Playing the
Lisbon Portuguese Guitarra by Ronald Louis Fernandez
(continued)
Section16a.
Fado do Marinheiro, an early Portuguese Fado
Here is an image of the "Fado do Marinheiro" which appeared
in 1904 in Alberto Pimental's book A Triste Canção do Sul (which means the Sad Song of the
South). Original publisher was Livraria Central, Lisboa.
The caption under the music says
that this: This Fado is the oldest which the elderly guitarist
Ambrósio Fernandes Maia claims to have known.
According to Pedro Caldeira Cabral
(A Guitarra Portuguesa, 1999:224) Ambrósio Fernandes Maia
was born in 1830 and died in 1912. We do not know when
Maia learned of this song but we might conjecture that it
was in the first half of the 19th century. While none of this
proves that this is "the earliest fado", it certainly suggests
that it is an early Fado song. I should mention here that Maia
was an important Portuguese Guitarist and that he authored 2
method books, one with D.L. Vieira in 1875 and one by himself in
1877 (republished in 1899 and 1900).
Below are my 2 versions of this piece. The first is my direct
transcription from the unclear image published in the old
book. In the second version I have transposed the melody
down an octave (which is easier to play on the Portuguese
guitarra and I have added a simple accompaniment for the Viola
de Fado (i.e., Spanish Guitar) part.
Here I have a few technical comments for
Musicologists.
The
first transcription is straight forward except for the
last note in the 10th bar. We can see in the
original sheet music (above) that the 3rd note in bar 10
is definitely a C#, and that the 5th note appears to
have been naturalized so it would be a C natural. I have
a problem with this C natural--it sounds out of place to
my ears. For years I just accepted it as a strange sound
composed in another time. Repeatedly I examined the
printed sheet music to decide whether there was really a
natural sign in front of the C. Was it a natural sign or
was it a sloppy sharp sign which was repeated? I could
not decide. So I looked elsewhere for answers.
In looking at the rest of the musical structure I
saw that at bar 12 there is a similar rhythm pattern
where the 2 highest notes in the bar are identical, they
are not a 1/2 tone apart as in bar 10. This
similarity suggested that perhaps the naturalized C was
a mistake. Next, I surveyed the book and found other
mistakes in written music. For example, on page 86 of
the Fado Corrido I found that the flat signs in the key
signature were misplaced in both the treble and bass
clefs--this shows carelessness with regard to the
musical content of the book. Consequently, I feel that
there is a good likelihood that the naturalized C could
be a mistake by a careless publisher. For these
reasons I feel justified in changing the naturalized C
in my version.
Image of misplaced flats
in key signature in both treble and bass clefs.
The 4 flats should be Bb, Eb, Ab, Db. Page 86 of
A Triste Canção do Sul.
