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Friday 9 January 2015

15th Week - O Amor Quando Se Revela (380th Song)



I was asked to make a song for a documentary again. It's about myths on Spanish and Portuguese culture, and they requested me to make a Portuguese fado to accompany with the images of Portugal that they are gonna show up and it would have to be done in 3 days. I said 'yes' instantly but, do I know how to do this? I did a research of fados and I found that they use to be very simple: just one Spanish guitar, one Portuguese guitar and a sad girl's voice. I could find someone to record the voice and I'd try the Spanish and Portuguese guitars, although I had no idea where to get one. So I started being sure that the singer I was thinking of to sing it was available to do it. She accepted: Wicked!

Now I got into a loop of hard work and stress to find a Portuguese guitar. I had 3 days to find it, record the song with it (however that instrument is played) and it's Friday. I'd deal with a bunch of closed companies. I called several instruments renting companies and they didn't have any Portuguese guitar at all. I did all the networking I could and didn't get any response: I had to find a substitute instrument, maybe a lute, maybe a mandolin, a bandurria. I don't know, whatever!

I started again my quest of the seek of that instrument that I'd need. I found a lute somewhere and I was up to close the deal and rent it but I just found a Portuguese guitar teacher in Madrid on a teaching website. I got a new plan! or 2! Either I rent the guitar from him or I could have a lesson from him and then record it at his home. He told me he wouldn't rent his guitar so I had to go there, learn about the instrument and how to play it and, this was great, he offered himself to play it, he just would charge me his teaching rate per hours. 

In the meanwhile I recorded the guitar (I spent so many hours, doing it until it sounded ok cause I'm a shitty guitarist) and Cris recorded the voice, she did really cool, we struggled with the accent but they told us that the accent wouldn't be very important cause the music in the documentary would be very quite. And went to teacher's home to end the song. He taught me about the guitar, it's a blending of traditional and futuristic instrument full of metallic pegs and double strings, very impressive. They play with plastic fake nails and the afination is B, A, E, B, A, D. As I didn't know this I recorded my song in Eb randomly chosen, so the performing would be a bit awkward. He was a shy guy and struggled to explain me about the guitar and as i had to make my own nails and glue them to my fingers in order to play it well, after 10 minutes of chatting, we decided to go straight to record. He did many takes, it was very awkward the tone for him and I could see it, but he played so well, and he's good post editing, so we end up with a good take that would work for sure. He even did the final mix, he know's the music better than me so he'd do much better than me. 

I got impressed after get the final product how pro-active I become and how I could make a song so different of what I'm used to do and make it sound good enough to make it pass for a Portuguese song. Hi five to me!

Enjoy it!

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