Rão Kyao

A long career, not only in Portugal but in several other countries, Lisbon born Rão Kyao has gained attention for his strong will of rediscovering Eastern music. Playing saxophone and bamboo flute, he found inspiration in jazz and then in indian, arabian and chinese music searching the lost link of traditional portuguese music and the Orient.The portuguese traditional popular city music is a strong reference of Kyao’s taste and background. Since the XIX century, fado shows an amalgamation of influences, such as moorish and arabic. That’s why 1983 is a referential year. Rão Kyao released “Fado Bailado” that year, which was the first platinum given to a portuguese record. With the help of António Chaínho, master of portuguese guitar, he covered some of the most important fado songs, plenty of them popularised by diva Amália Rodrigues. The voice was then translated to a saxophone.By 1996 he returned to the purity of fado with “Viva o Fado”, recorded live at Amália Fado Club. At that time he used the flute but also a traditional fado combo. Only an artist as Rão Kyao, with his extreme sensibility, is able to translate the real soul of fado and the saudade feeling which is extremely well represented in this record. Since “Fado das Canas” till the well known “Mariquinhas”, Rão Kyao evokes the voices of Amália Rodrigues, Alfredo Marceneiro, Hermínia Silva and Lucília do Carmo. As in «Fado Bailado» (1983), once again Rão Kyao took fado to a new dimension.1999 - Recorded “Junção” with the Macau’s Chinese Orchestra and composed the official anthom for the ceremony of transference of the territory of Macau to China.2001 When everyone started talking about a new generation of fado singers (Dulce Pontes, Mísia), the pioneer Rão Kyao recorded once more his unique fado approach. This time with the special collaboration of Pedro Ayres Magalhães and Teresa Salgueiro (Madredeus songwriter and singer), fado singer Deolinda Bernardo and moorish musicians Gazi (violin) and Barmaki (percussion), all of them protagonists of a new vision for the Lisbon song, this time at the light of orient music.2004 - A new album ,”Porto Alto”, has just been released! Rão Kyao describes it as follows: «The jorney of a dream through the music of Portugal, country of the Bread, Olive oil and the Wine». Gerardo Núñez (the virtuoso New Flamenco, Guitar player), Tito Paris (Great Cap Vert Guitar player) and Carlos Gonçalves (Portuguese Guitar player) are some of the guest players in this record.The official presentation was held at Rock in Rio Lisbon on May 28 (Roots Tent).I edited my profile at Freeweblayouts.net , check out these Myspace Layouts!