TRAVEL TUESDAY 464 - LISBON, PORTUGAL

“Lisbon is clarity through the air. Lisbon is the stained colour of the walls. Lisbon is new moss rising over dry moss. Lisbon is the design of cracks, like lightning, running down the surface of the walls. Lisbon is a judicious imperfection. Lisbon is the reflected sky.” – Jose Luis Peixoto

Welcome to the Travel Tuesday meme! Join me every Tuesday and showcase your creativity in photography, painting and drawing, music, poetry, creative writing or a plain old natter about Travel.

There is only one simple rule: Link your own creative work about some aspect of travel and share it with the rest of us.

Please use this meme for your creative endeavours only. Do not use this meme to advertise your products or services as any links or comments by advertisers will be removed immediately.

Lisbon (Portuguese: Lisboa) is the capital and the largest city of Portugal, with a population of 552,700 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km². Its urban area extends beyond the city's administrative limits with a population of around 2.7 million people, being the 11th-most populous urban area in the European Union. About 2.8 million people live in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area (which represents approximately 27% of the country's population). It is continental Europe's westernmost capital city and the only one along the Atlantic coast.

Lisbon lies in the western Iberian Peninsula on the Atlantic Ocean and the River Tagus. The westernmost area of its metro area is the westernmost point of Continental Europe. Lisbon is recognised as a global city because of its importance in finance, commerce, media, entertainment, arts, international trade, education and tourism. It is one of the major economic centres on the continent, with a growing financial sector and one of the largest container ports on Europe's Atlantic coast.

Lisbon is one of the oldest cities in the world, and the oldest in Western Europe, predating other modern European capitals such as London, Paris and Rome by centuries. Julius Caesar made it a municipium called Felicitas Julia, adding to the name Olissipo. Ruled by a series of Germanic tribes from the 5th century, it was captured by the Moors in the 8th century. In 1147, the Crusaders under Afonso Henriques reconquered the city and since then it has been a major political, economic and cultural centre of Portugal.

Unlike most capital cities, Lisbon's status as the capital of Portugal has never been granted or confirmed officially – by statute or in written form. Its position as the capital has formed through constitutional convention, making its position as de facto capital a part of the Constitution of Portugal.

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TRAVEL TUESDAY 289 - LISBON, PORTUGAL

“Oh salty sea, how much of your salt is tears from Portugal?” – Fernando Pessoa

Welcome to the Travel Tuesday meme! Join me every Tuesday and showcase your creativity in photography, painting and drawing, music, poetry, creative writing or a plain old natter about Travel.

There is only one simple rule: Link your own creative work about some aspect of travel and share it with the rest of us. Please use this meme for your creative endeavours only.

Do not use this meme to advertise your products or services as any links or comments by advertisers shall be removed immediately.

Lisbon (Portuguese: Lisboa) is the capital and the largest city of Portugal, with a population of 552,700 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km². Its urban area extends beyond the city's administrative limits with a population of around 2.7 million people, being the 11th-most populous urban area in the European Union. About 2.8 million people live in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area (which represents approximately 27% of the country's population). It is continental Europe's westernmost capital city and the only one along the Atlantic coast.

Lisbon lies in the western Iberian Peninsula on the Atlantic Ocean and the River Tagus. The westernmost area of its metro area is the westernmost point of Continental Europe. Lisbon is recognised as a global city because of its importance in finance, commerce, media, entertainment, arts, international trade, education and tourism. It is one of the major economic centres on the continent, with a growing financial sector and one of the largest container ports on Europe's Atlantic coast.

Lisbon is one of the oldest cities in the world, and the oldest in Western Europe, predating other modern European capitals such as London, Paris and Rome by centuries. Julius Caesar made it a municipium called Felicitas Julia, adding to the name Olissipo. Ruled by a series of Germanic tribes from the 5th century, it was captured by the Moors in the 8th century. In 1147, the Crusaders under Afonso Henriques reconquered the city and since then it has been a major political, economic and cultural centre of Portugal.

Unlike most capital cities, Lisbon's status as the capital of Portugal has never been granted or confirmed officially – by statute or in written form. Its position as the capital has formed through constitutional convention, making its position as de facto capital a part of the Constitution of Portugal.

This post is part of the Our World Tuesday meme,

and also part of the Ruby Tuesday meme,

and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme.

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TRAVEL TUESDAY 225 - COIMBRA, PORTUGAL

“Oh salty sea, how much of your salt is tears from Portugal?” – Fernando Pessoa 

Welcome to the Travel Tuesday meme! Join me every Tuesday and showcase your creativity in photography, painting and drawing, music, poetry, creative writing or a plain old natter about Travel.

There is only one simple rule: Link your own creative work about some aspect of travel and share it with the rest of us. Please use this meme for your creative endeavours only.

Do not use this meme to advertise your products or services as any links or comments by advertisers shall be removed immediately.

Coimbra is a city and a municipality in Portugal. The population at the 2011 census was 143,397, in an area of 319.40 square kilometres. It is the fourth-largest urban centre in Portugal (after Lisbon, Porto and Braga), and is the largest city of the district of Coimbra, the Centro region and the Baixo Mondego subregion. About 460,000 people live in the Região de Coimbra, comprising 19 municipalities and extending into an area 4,336 square kilometres.

Among the many archaeological structures dating back to the Roman era, when Coimbra was the settlement of Aeminium, are its well-preserved aqueduct and cryptoporticus. Similarly, buildings from the period when Coimbra was the capital of Portugal (from 1131 to 1255) still remain. During the Late Middle Ages, with its decline as the political centre of the Kingdom of Portugal, Coimbra began to evolve into a major cultural centre. This was in large part helped by the establishment the University of Coimbra in 1290, the oldest academic institution in the Portuguese-speaking world.

Apart from attracting many European and international students, the university is visited by many tourists for its monuments and history. Its historical buildings were classified as a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 2013: “Coimbra offers an outstanding example of an integrated university city with a specific urban typology as well as its own ceremonial and cultural traditions that have been kept alive through the ages.”

This post is part of the Our World Tuesday meme,
and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme.

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MUSIC SATURDAY - CARLOS SEIXAS

“Music is the best means we have of digesting time.” - W. H. Auden

José António Carlos de Seixas (June 11, 1704 – August 25, 1742) was a pre-eminent Portuguese composer of the 18th century. An accomplished virtuoso of both the organ and the harpsichord, Seixas succeeded his father as the organist for Coimbra Cathedral at the age of fourteen. In 1720, he departed for the capital, Lisbon, where he was to serve as the organist for the royal chapel, one of the highest offices for a musician in Portugal, the position earning him a knighthood. Much of Seixas’ music rests in an ambiguous transitional period from the learned style of the 17th century to the gallant style of the 18th century.

Seixas was born in Coimbra to Francisco Vaz and Marcelina Nunes. From a young age, he was surrounded by musical activity; his father served as the cathedral organist, and the flurry of musical activity in the local monastery of Santa Cruz had an equally important role in his musical training. In 1718, a few days before his father’s death, Seixas succeeded his father as cathedral organist. Two years after, in 1720, he moved to Lisbon to take up his new position in the court of John V of Portugal as court organist and harpsichordist.

Citing his elegance and agility on the keyboard, he was a favourite teacher of many noble families, including the family of Luís Xavier Furtado de Mendonça, the Viscount of Barbacena, where he gave harpsichord lessons to the Viscount’s wife and daughters in exchange for artistic patronage. In Lisbon, Seixas met Italian composer Domenico Scarlatti, who was working in Portugal from 1719 to 1728 as appointed director of the court cathedral.

In an account by José Mazza in his Diccionario biographico de Musicos portugueses e noticia das suas composições of 1780, the king’s brother, Dom António, arranged for Scarlatti to give Seixas harpsichord lessons. Scarlatti, immediately recognising Seixas’ talent, replied, “You can give me lessons.” In 1731 he was married at age twenty-eight to D. Maria Joana Tomásia da Silva, with whom he had two sons and three daughters. He was knighted in 1738 by the king, inducted into the Order of Christ. Four years later, in 1742, he died of a rheumatic fever, and was buried in the Santa Maria Basilica in Lisbon.

Seixas’ keyboard works were written for a variety of instruments, including the organ, harpsichord, and the clavichord. Stylistically speaking, however, his sonatas showcase a range of musical styles: some are exemplary of a Baroque toccata; some are firmly in the gallant style; some are clearly influenced by the German Empfindsamer Stil (literally 'sensitive style'). Despite rarely, if ever, traveling outside of Lisbon, his work also includes various geographical styles, such as the German Mannheim school, the French minuet, and the Italian style as composed by Scarlatti, his colleague and contemporary.

Santiago Kastner, Seixas’ biographer and editor of his pieces, describes Seixas’ works as “unoccupied” with a particular form, and given over to frequent improvisation. Much of his work was destroyed in the earthquake that devastated Lisbon in 1755. Only three orchestral pieces and around one hundred keyboard sonatas out of over an alleged seven hundred survived, plus a handful of choral works for liturgical use (much more conservative than what one would expect from his instrumental music).

Here is his Mass in G Major, for Soloists, Chorus, Strings and Continuo performed by the Norwegian Baroque Orchestra directed from the organ by Ketil Haugsand.

LITERARY TUESDAY - MIGUEL TORGA

“Do not disturb the peace that I’ve managed to attain. Hearing your voice again would be like trying to quench thirst with salt water.” - Miguel Torga

Miguel Torga is the nom de plume of Portuguese author Adolfo Correia da Rocha (1907 – 1995), born in Trás-os-Montes, a remote, desolate, poor region in the North of the country, a place from which many natives were to emigrate in search of a better future. He is considered one of the greatest Portuguese writers of the 20th century. He wrote poetry, short stories, theatre and a 16-volume diary. Miguel Torga became known first through his beautiful poems, but his significant literary work also includes prose.

“Tales from the Mountain”, is a collection of short stories focussed on the way of life and the people of his native land, and more specifically the place of his birth Trás-os-Montes. The author was throughout his life sentimentally rooted to this region, reliving memories of his early childhood, a place he was forced to leave but whose nostalgic prints remained forever in his mind.

However, these are not water-coloured tales of soppy sentimentality. Trás-os-Montes is an isolated area of Portugal, where people have to struggle to make the infertile, sparse land yield frugal crops. The lives of the people there are harsh and bitter, and the author does not hide the truth of their hard labours and brutal exigencies. But, lighting the gloom and softening the tone, Torga imbues his stories with history and culture, which transcend the harsh existence of his characters.

These short stories have a universal appeal, but especially so for anyone familiar with life on the land and its many vicissitudes. Narration is in the third person, and the reader becomes involved in the lament for the life of those who live and face their often bleak destiny. With these twenty-two short tales (about six pages each), the reader discovers the breadth of human nature, the commonality of experiences and the elemental passions that drive all of us.

In one story, a man struggles with the diagnosis of leprosy and the banishment from his village; in another, a thief robs a church but discovers the hard way that someone else has done his dirty work before him; a village prostitute gets such little help from the men that fathered her children, that she comes to believe that her children have no fathers; a voodoo doll causes a mysterious death; a young boy gets his first Christmas present but also learns at the same time that a family member close to him has died; an elderly gravedigger prepares his own grave, thankful at last that his miserable existence is ending; a covert community of Jews take great pains to hide their religion from the majority of Catholics that makes up the village; a lame shepherd receives the accolade of the village by beating a wolf to death; while a priest unexpectedly delivers a baby…

Torga’s brutally frank view of rural life led to the banning of the “Tales from the Mountains” when they were first published. Later editions were published in Brazil, smuggled into Portugal and passed from hand to hand in literary and student circles. Torga was imprisoned for his unremitting opposition to the Salazar regime. He has since risen to an unrivalled position in modern Portuguese literature, with fifty published works to his credit, including poetry, fiction, plays, journals, essays, and a celebrated autobiography. He has received numerous international awards, twice been nominated for the Nobel Prize, and his work has been translated into most languages.

I guess from my description that it is easy to dismiss these Tales as irrelevant to today’s urban dwellers. After all one may remark, the author was born into a family of illiterate country people and he describes harsh village life that is far removed from today’s modern city slickers. But Torga speaks a universal human language, complex in emotion and thought, direct in action, dealing with matters of love and hate, life and death. He speaks with direct and terse language, describing lives without the comfortable illusions and material expectations that protect most people. It is this honesty and stripping back of human nature to its essence that makes his writing accessible and relevant to all who may read it.

PORTUGAL

“I’ve got two places I like to be. Portugal is one.” - Cliff Richard
 
Magpie Tales has given us a Mark Haley photograph to inspire us and stimulate some writing for all those who take part in her challenge. Here is my offering, based on a detail of the image.
 
Portugal
 
Some day I’ll summon enough courage to flee.
Flee from your grey skies, grey days, grey people,
Hard, heartless land.
To Lisbon where sun shines in sky azure like satin,
Where flowers garland ancient walls,
To Portugal.
 
People still sing the fado
Dance in the streets,
In Portugal...
Guitars ring out, caressing nights of velvet
In Coimbra, Lisbon and Portó.
There’s love still to be found
In honey-coloured skin
And sparkling raven hair,
“Ay! Mi Amor!”
In Portugal!
 
Festering wound, my heart, in exile will not heal
Unless I feel Spring coming -
For Spring still comes
To Portugal!
 
Ah! But to roam the streets of Lisbon,
To drink red-wine sun,
To breathe sea-flower air,
To love warm-honey skin,
In Portugal...

MUSIC SATURDAY - FADO

“Music is the shorthand of emotion.” - Leo Tolstoy
 
Anna Moura (born 1979 in Santarém, Portugal) is an internationally recognised Portuguese fado singer, and the youngest fadista to be nominated for a Dutch Edison Award. Ana Moura’s debut album was “Guarda-me a vida na mão” (2003), followed by “Aconteceu” (2005). She sang in various nightspots in Lisbon and became known on television, performing fado with Antonio Pinto Basto.
 
“Para Além da Saudade” (2007), containing songs such as “Os Buzios” or “Fado da Procura”, is the album that followed “Aconteceu”. With this album and appearances on programs such as Family Contact and Superstar, Moura became more widely known in Portugal. These television appearances helped promote this record, which was to reach triple platinum for sales exceeding 55,000 units. The album stayed in the Top 30 in Portugal for 120 weeks. For this album, Moura received a nomination for the Golden Globes in the category of Music, Best Individual Performer, losing to Jorge Palma.
 
Here is Anna Moura’s “Desfado” of 2012, showcasing her velvety voice, soulful lyrics and wonderful music. Enjoy!

ART SUNDAY - JOÃO MARQUES DE OLIVEIRA

“All is ephemeral, - fame and the famous as well” - Marcus Aurelius

For Art Sunday today, a little-known painter from Portugal. His name is João Marques de Oliveira and he was born in Porto, Portugal, on August 23rd, 1853, dying on the 9th October 1927 at the age of 64. He was a naturalist painter who specialised in painting landscapes, portraits and genre scenes. In 1864 he joined the Porto Academy of Fine Arts, completing the course of the history of painting in 1873. He lived in France from 1873 to 1879, with his colleague Silva Porto (1859-1893), with whom he studied in the Porto Academy. Both of the painters received a bursary for further study from the Portuguese Government after competing for a painting prize.

Both painters are considered the initiators of naturalism in Portugal. In 1876 and 1877 he travelled with Silva Porto to Belgium, the Netherlands, England and Italy, where he remained for some time. De Oliveira participated in the Paris Salons of 1876 and 1878. In 1879, he returned to Porto and with Silva Porto, introduced “plein air” outdoor painting to Portugal. Back in Portugal, De Oliveira created with Columbano Bordallo Pinheiro, the Lion Group, so named because its members met in a brewery of the same name. From 1881 and until 1926 he taught at the Porto Academy of Fine Arts, where he held the post of Director. His friend Silva Porto was appointed Professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Lisbon.

Naturalism in art refers to the depiction of realistic objects in a natural setting. The Realism movement of the 19th century advocated naturalism in reaction to the stylised and idealised depictions of subjects in Romanticism, but many painters have adopted a similar approach over the centuries. Naturalism is a type of art that pays attention to very accurate and precise details, and portrays things as they are.

De Oliveira’s work is painterly, full of vivacious brushstrokes and with a good understanding of colour and light. His landscapes have a more impressionistic quality to them, while his large easel genre paintings owe much to Gustave Courbet, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes or even to Jean-François Millet who was active earlier. During his travels, the artist would have familiarised himself with the prevalent styles of the time and he made his choice, leaning towards realism and classicism while wilfully ignoring the more modern waves of surrealism, expressionism, fauvism, cubism, and abstract expressionism – especially so later in his life when he returned to Portugal to assume the directorship of the conservative Porto Academy of Fine Arts.

As such, his work has been somewhat neglected, as the critics class his painting as derivative and backward-looking, rather than innovative and of a personally distinctive style. However, his work has much to offer and I believe he merits more attention. While his painting is highly decorative it is also lively, and his skill as a fine draughtsman cannot be denied. The painting above of 1892 “Waiting for the Boats” shows a beautiful use of colour and light, is beautifully composed and drawn, while the artist conveys skillfully the expectation for the return of the fishermen by their wives and daughters on the beach. Such scenes of everyday life are the mainstay of naturalism, with the artist often making a social comment by the themes he chose.

BLACK ROSE

“A rose is the visible result of an infinitude of complicated goings on in the bosom of the earth and in the air above, and similarly a work of art is the product of strange activities in the human mind.” - Clive Bell

It was a beautiful, fine day today and perfect for some gardening. And so it was. Alas, my hands are blistered, scratched and cut from the serious pruning and weeding that took most of the day, however, it was all worth it as the garden looks all the better for it. Most of our rose bushes are getting a little old, which is sad as we have a large and varied selection. I like a rose to possess fragrance as well as look beautiful, so most of our roses are both fragrant and also every shade available: White, yellow, gold, orange, all shades of red, burgundy, many pinks,  and lavender. However, we need to do some serious culling, taking out the oldest and start replacing them with new bushes in the spring.

And as we are speaking of roses, here is some world music performed by “Rosa Negra” (Black Rose). Rosa Negra is a five-piece “novo fado” group, a variation on the age-old traditional Portuguese genre of the fado (popular songs of love, loss and fate). This is a flexible genre that allows the influence of other music to seep through and assert themselves. This piece from 2006, “Fado Ladino”, has significant Asian and Arabic influences that infiltrate the familiar Iberian, but not enough that the music gives itself up totally to foreign genres and loses its natural Portuguese soul.

The lush string instrumentation is amplified by trumpet, piano, accordion and percussion, which together creates a sensual and dramatic tapestry of emotions and textures. But the heart of the group is the vocals of Carmo the lead songstress, whose interpretation of the typically gloomy lyrics (intense songs about love, loss of love, longing for past, and fado itself) are, theatrical and utterly captivating. Her navigation of that fine line between the ancient and the new is quite compelling.

Here is the gist of the lyrics:
“A warm breeze inside me blows and raises me towards the East. Is it real or a mirage on the road? Will it have an end? Perhaps the wind hides my destiny behind the shadows of loneliness… Fado Ladino, my heart is like a black rose, waiting amongst the delights of the garden. A rose in an oasis of eternal hope, a feeling of jasmine memories in my heart.”

AMÁLIA RODRIGUES

“Is there anything better than to be longing for something, when you know it is within reach?” - Greta Garbo

Another busy week that was quite tiring and on some occasions stressful. Thankfully today was a day of rest and relaxation. We went shopping this morning, followed by a visit to the library. It’s always good to visit the library, and today it seems that many people had the same idea. The weather may have helped as it was hot and quite muggy. Libraries are always cool an air-conditioned! This evening dinner out and a wonderful time just enjoying intimate company.

For Song Saturday today, a singer that was a favourite of my grandmother, my mother and now of myself! She is the famous Portuguese Fado singer, Amália Rodrigues (1920-1999). She had a brilliant 40-year international career and her velvet voice was perfectly suited to the Portuguese “blues” of the fado – a passionate, mournful and emotional style of music. This music is usually linked to the Portuguese word “saudade” which symbolises the feeling of loss (a permanent, irreparable loss and its consequent life-lasting damage).

This song, “Coimbra” was written in the 1930’s, with music by Raul Ferrao and lyrics by José Galhardo, but more widely known as “April in Portugal”. Coimbra is a city in Portugal on the Mondego River about 100 miles north of Lisbon. It is also the seat of an old university, and the original lyrics of this romantic song are such an odd, incomprehensible allusion to student life that one can hardly imagine that anybody wrote them with any expectation that the song would become world-famous. It did indeed achieve fame, though, with new title and new lyrics in English, French and other languages. Choupal is a district along the Mondego, and Inês was the heroine of a medieval drama.

COIMBRA (Original Portuguese Lyrics)

Coimbra do Choupal,
Ainda és capital
De amor em Portugal,
Ainda és capital.

Coimbra, onde uma vez
Com lágrimas se fez
A história dessa Inês taõ linda

Coimbra das canções
Taõ meigas que nos pões
Os nossos corações à luz.
Coimbra dos doctores,
Pra nós os seus cantores
A fonte de amor és tu.

Coimbra e uma liçaõ de sonho e tradiçaõ.
O lente e uma cançaõ e a lua a faculdade.
O livro é uma mulher só passa quem souber
E aprende-se a dizer saudade.

COIMBRA (Literal English Translation)

Coimbra of the Choupal,
You are still capital
Of love in Portugal,
You are still capital.

Coimbra, where once upon a time
The tearful story of the lovely Inês
Took place…

Coimbra of the songs
So tender that you turn
Our hearts to the light.
Coimbra of the professors,
For us, your singers,
The fount of love you are.

Coimbra is a lesson of dreams and tradition.
The lens is a song and the moon is the faculty.
The book is a lady. Whoever just passes knows
And learns to say ‘longing’.