Remembering Cesaria Evora; of manner, mystery and mystique

By GUS MARTINS

In death, as in life, Cesaria Evora remains somewhat of an enigma.  The mystery is how this stoic, almost expressionless, singer provoked such a deep and emotive reaction from fans around the world, many of whom didn’t know her language or country of origin.

 Evora, who died Dec. 17^th of respiratory failure at age 70, held that same bewitching quality over her own musicians, who wondered how she captivated audiences with her impassive manner. But her ample adherents didn’t seem to mind, embracing every nuance of her live performances with an almost evangelical devotion.

The logical explanation was talent. Evora’s wonderful contralto dripped with sincerity and wisdom and people related to it. But there also existed an ineffable quality, something that very few people can adequately answer. That indefinable element led people from places as dissimilar as Argentina to Turkey, Belgium to Thailand and from Slovenia to South Africa and points in between to connect to a singer who bared without self-pity, the soul of a tough life but who later rose to fame and adulation.

 “I used to tell her that she had a mystery about her that I can’t explain and nobody else can explain and she would laugh, laugh, laugh,’’ said Rhode Island-based Kalu Monteiro, who played drums for Evora for about three years in the early 2000’s. “I said you must be some kind of witch or something. You are a mysterious woman. She had a great sense for people. She was amazing at that. Some things you can’t answer and other things you can. It was that voice. That voice was like hypnosis. That voice hypnotizes people.  I used to look at the audience’s faces from the stage and there’d be people looking at her like mesmerized in awe. Then I’d start closing my eyes just listening to her voice and I’d find myself flying up in the sky somewhere. Her voice could capture you. It was some kind of a magnet.’’

Monteiro, who witnessed first-hand Evora’s universality as she transcended national boundaries and social class distinctions playing for people of all walks of life, said there were myriad instances of people wanting to meet and greet her wherever they traveled. It was related to her unique singing voice, its various qualities and her very own phrasing. But it was also related to the transparency of her life and the hand-to-mouth existence that she endured for decades and never tried to hide.

Evora possessed intangibles that made people want to get to know her, even as she guarded her privacy. While not publicly affable she was said to develop deep bonds with her musicians, whom she would travel with by bus during tours when she normally had a flight booked for her for longer distances.

Italian academician Francesca Dal Lago, who got to know Evora over a decade-long period and even visited Evora in hospital last September in Paris when the Grammy Award winning singer announced her retirement, believes Evora’s public veneration stemmed from a mixture of attributes that deepened her mystery.

 “I think what was so attractive was she was a diva because she became so popular but she didn’t have any of the qualities normally associated with a diva,’’ said Dal Lago. “She was simple. She was direct. She was a certain age. People don’t become symbols at that age. They become symbols in their 20’s and 30’s.’’

A Chinese studies specialist by profession, Dal Lago said the anti-star image which Evora personified was endearing because it was not born of affectation or fakery, but was genuine in every way.

“I hadn’t seen her like this major star or myth,’’ added the researcher and professor who has taught at Montreal’s McGill University and at Leiden University in Holland,. “I was kind of like from the inner-circle. Now since she died I started realizing how much she meant. I started reading all of these things. I knew she was big but I hadn’t focused on how and why, etc. One of the things that made her so irresistible to people is that she could let people know somehow that she had a very painful life and yet she could get through it. I think it is the pain that she could somehow communicate and let people know about was one of the keys to her attraction. She let people know that you can do this type of thing and you have suffered so much.’’

The harshness of Evora’s life, when seen in the context of today’s pop culture, makes her rise even more meaningful. In an era of Jersey Shore, Snooki and the Kardashians where good looks, but no redeeming talent or brutish, almost antisocial, behavior with potentially destructive social consequences, is  rewarded with ubiquitous publicity and outlandish sums of money, Evora never had anything but her talent to fall back on. She spent time in orphanages as a child and missed what could have been some of her best professional years in her 20’s, 30’s and 40’s because of a lack of opportunity.

Ron Kaplan, Evora’s American-based booking agent for 15 years, said her acceptance in France was no coincidence because there was and still exists a sizeable portion of the population that appreciated talent for talent’s sake. That appreciation, he said, continues today with newer artists

“When you look at the popularity Cesaria had in France, for instance, how perfect is that when you see Nora Jones and Melanie Gardot all doing well in this era in France,’’ he asked, rhetorically?  “Then you see Imelda (May), one of our clients, whose record is blowing up there. It’s just the way it is. Those countries praise and need voices. The difference is that Melanie and Nora are in their 20’s and 30’s, are very sexy and had a much bigger pool to fall into because of their image. Whereas Cesaria was a 50’s-to-60’s-plus, overweight, not very attractive woman that is not embraced by the media, especially the way the media is now. It’s all about looks, it’s all about size and it’s all about shape and then they talk about talent.’’

Tales abound of chance meetings with people on the streets and at her concerts doing unconventional things just to get near her. There was an afternoon in a Paris eatery when a street youth came dashing into a full restaurant and walked past others straight to Cesaria just for a glass of water. Evora was said to welcome the child, giving him what he needed against the wishes of the manager, before he was sent on his way.

Then there was an unusual event that Kalu Monteiro said occurred in Europe following a show that simply blew everyone’s mind. He said that the band’s tour manager for several years, Angelo Spencer, witnessed something that left him speechless.

“Angelo told me a story one time right after a concert,’’ said Monteiro. “This gentleman was trying to get to Cesaria to talk to her. Angelo told him to come after the concert and I’ll connect you with her. When the guy got to Cesaria, he just got down on his knees and started kissing her feet. Then he goes, ‘I want to thank you because you made my wife peaceful in her deathbed and that’s all that she wanted to do was listen to you and that’s how she was able to pass away in peace. You are the one that I have to thank for that.’ Cesaria was stunned and she kinds of takes things (in a blasé fashion) and Angelo was like, ‘What just happened?’ ’’

Dal Lago said she attended two of the final three shows that Evora performed in Milan and Venice and while it was by then a visibly older woman and a different singer, she said none of that mattered to the audience.

“In Venice it was the very last one,’’ she said. “It was a beautiful theatre like the famous theatres there are in Venice, like an 18^th century opera house.  The public was crazy and enthusiastic. She was very tired. But she got to a point where I think if she just stood on the stage and did nothing people would just adore her anyway. She has all these beautiful musicians around her.  I always compare her to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Even if she wasn’t singing she would have that affect, I like to say. I don’t know. But I’m just saying the public doesn’t tell that the voice was different. I know my friends and the musicians I know would remark how the voice had changed but the public doesn’t see that.’’

 Dal Lago, who brought her 83-year-old father to see the show, said the public was there to shower their singer with affection.

“I think it has to do with her as a person,’’ she said. “I think the added value that she as a person contributed to the music she did was the trick. Because let’s say it was somebody else doing the same music with the same musicians, I’m not sure they would obtain the same results. I think she reached her fans through the pain and sorrow. It’s probably those sides that attracted people to her more than the happy sides of the coladera. Of course people are very happy when she is singing happy songs.  It makes a great mood but then they’ll turn back to the “morna” (ballads) which brought people back to what life was all about and I think that was one of the keys.’’

“I gather that she knew she had something,’’ added Monteiro. “ But, it was like, she didn’t bother to think about it. She just went on. She wasn’t materialistic or anything like that. She was about doing her thing. That’s why I told her. There’s something mysterious about you. I don’t know what it is. I’m trying to figure it out. ‘’

Monteiro, who said he recently tracked down former band member and roommate Cuban violinist Leonel  Bermudez ,who is now working and living in Ecuador. Monteiro said he’d never forget Bermudez’s reaction to Evora many years ago.

“Leo was so funny,’’ mused Monteiro. “He put it so simple one day I was dying. He goes, ‘Kalu can you imagine this. Look at this. This little short lady, barefooted, walks onto the stage (holds his arms out) and just stands there and when she opens up that voice you just see everyone dazed. She doesn’t move and she doesn’t do anything. And then she gets off the stage and people are like dying over her performance. How do you explain this? What is this? ‘I said Leo, the day you discover that secret you explain it to me because I don’t know what it is.’ It’s true. This lady just walked onto the middle of that floor, grabbed a microphone and just opens her voice. Bang. That’s it.’’