Kavita Shah: “Melancholy is a kind of blues”

Kavita Shah was in Portugal for three concerts, visiting CCB in Lisbon and Casa da Música in Porto. The visit to our country became part of the tour of the North American singer, which began with ten concerts in the USA, from Portugal she left for Cape Verde, where she performed in Mindelo and in the city of Praia, and will end with a concert on December 2 at the Le Bal Blomet jazz club in Paris. The New Yorker was accompanied by musicians living in Cape Verde and Portugal, and only now, after the pandemic, was it possible to bring them together for the presentation of her third album, Cape Verdean Blues. The album was produced in collaboration with Cape Verdean guitarist Bau, who was part of Cesaria Evora’s band and who is also an indispensable member of Kavita Shah’s concerts.

Kavita attended a concert by Cesaria Évora when she was twenty years old and living in Salvador da Bahia. The experience of meeting the Cape Verdean diva live impressed the singer, who was partial to her strength and depth.

“First of all, my heart was struck by the Morna of Caesarea. I think morna is a kind of blues. It’s a feeling of longing that I already knew. Having lived in a house with an immigrant family. This is the feeling that I learned while singing Morna and watching Cesaria: whether it was a heavy song or a happy one, she had a way of singing in which she did not put emphasis, did not emphasize the meaning, it was just a vehicle for that song. This is a kind of “Zen”, a way of accepting life as it is. For being such a simple person, she was extraordinary. I try to do some of what she did. to try to understand how I can accept my life as it is,” says Kavita Shah.

The desire to get to know Cape Verde inevitably came true. “When I arrived in 2016, I immediately met Bau, but this was not expected, it was a coincidence. They introduced me, I didn’t even know who Bau was, I went to his house for cavaquinho classes. When I realized who he was. So when I heard him play, I left the cavaquinho aside and just wanted to sing with him. It was a very natural process, I had never thought about recording an album of Cape Verdean music. It was an exchange from one musician to another. We sat for hours at his house, talking about music, exchanging notes that were interesting to each of us. He showed me a lot of things from Cape Verde, not only Cesaria, but also other composers. We We developed a repertoire together and started giving concerts,” says Kavita.

He returned to Cape Verde in 2018 to do more research into Cape Verdean music, particularly morna and coladeira, and the idea to record some songs came up. After many concerts, including a performance at the Kavala Fresk festival, Kavita thought that the work done could go into the studio to make some memories. “When we went into the studio, we were having so much fun that we ended up recording ten songs. The idea came up to make a Cape Verdean Blues album,” the singer recalls. It all started with the songs of Cesaria Evora, which I already knew, as a way to learn Creole and get into music. “Amor di Mundo”, Teofilo Chantre, Angola, Ramiro Mendez, Flor di Nya Esperanza, Morna Size. Then I became friends with many composers, for example Morgadinho, now over ninety years old, was a great singer and trumpeter from the Voz de Cabo Verde group. I even wrote a morna with him for this album, he wrote me a poem about my time in Cape Verde , learning to sing the morna. I also became friends with Vasco Martins, a great composer, especially in music. classics, but there are also very beautiful mornes. We performed Situações Triangulares, an instrumental waltz, and also Um Porta Aberta, a spectacular Vasco morna that has a lot of tradition but is also very Creole. Since I am of Indian origin, I wanted to share my culture with Bau and other musicians and we wrote a song called Chaki Bem. This is a lullaby that my parents sang to me when I was little. I sing this song wherever I go. It’s easy and suitable for any musician to come and exchange ideas, we have adapted Chucky Boehm to the rhythm of Cape Verde, cola son john. The album also features the song Javan Flor de Lis. A lot of people ask me why there’s a Brazilian song on the Cape Verde compilation, but it was a huge influence, especially on Cape Verde guitar. This song was a benchmark for me, as someone who went to Brazil to study Portuguese because I loved singing Brazilian music, and also for Bau. Since we always exchange the things we like best, it was a way to get to know each other and we had fun playing Flor de Lis. I also have Sodade, Cesaria’s hymn. This is my personal anthem because I recorded it for my first album with completely different instruments,” says Kavita Shah.

The title “Cape Verdean Blues” from his third album is taken from a song by American jazz pianist Horace Silver. Descendant of Cape Verdeans. “In this work, it was important for me to honor the legacy of Horace. To make a connection between the blues, American jazz and morna. Because the feeling of longing is a kind of blues,” says the singer.

One of the songs on the album is Joia. A Boy Ge Mendes original recorded by Kavita, for which the video clip is now available. “It’s interesting because I knew that Boy Je Mendes grew up in Dakar (Senegal) and it was through the sweets or sukrinya that his mother brought that he discovered the land of Cape Verde. I always thought it was a love song, but it’s a song for your mother. For me, it shows the beauty of Cape Verdean women, and in honor of her I decided to make a music video,” says the North American singer of the recordings, which were played thanks to the friendly rain that made the landscape of the islands of São Vicente and Santo Antan greener.