The Grandma loves fado, and she is a great fan of Mísia. She discovered Carlos Paredes thanks to the Catalan-Portuguese artist, and she has wanted to remember and enjoy both of them.
Carlos Paredes (16 February 1925-23 July 2004) was a virtuoso Portuguese guitar player and composer.
He is regarded as one of the greatest players of Portuguese guitar of all-time.
Born in Coimbra, Portugal, in a family with a long tradition of guitar playing, he was taught to play the Portuguese guitar by his father, Artur Paredes. He composed numerous soundtracks for cinema and theatre, such as the soundtrack for the Portuguese film Os Verdes Anos (1963), which contains his famous piece Canção Verde Anos. He released several recordings as a solo artist and performed in numerous countries worldwide.
Besides his music career, Paredes also worked in the public service for most of his life. In 1958, during Portugal's dictatorial Estado Novo regime, he was imprisoned for 18 months for joining the Portuguese Communist Party, at the time an illegal organization.
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Carlos Paredes was born in Coimbra on 16 February 1925. His father was Artur Paredes, an acclaimed player of Portuguese guitar from Coimbra. His grandfather Gonçalo Paredes, his great-uncle Manuel Paredes and his great-grandfather António Paredes were also guitar players.
Around 1934, aged 9, Paredes and his family moved to Lisbon. He did his primary education at the João de Deus School, and after attended the Passos Manuel Lyceum. While attending the lyceum, he had violin and piano lessons. In 1943, he entered the Industrial Course in Instituto Superior Técnico, but was enrolled for only one year.
He started playing guitar when he was 4 years-old, taught by his father. At age 9, he began accompanying his father on the guitar, in his father's concerts. At age 14, Carlos and Artur Paredes started participating on a weekly show in the Emissora Nacional de Radiodifusão, Portugal's public national radio broadcaster, a show that was created by Artur Paredes himself.
In 1949, he became a public service worker, a job he would retire from only later in life, in November 1986. He worked in the radiography archive of the Hospital de São José, in Lisbon, while maintaining his musical career.
Paredes grew up in an environment of discreet resistance and political opposition to António Salazar's Estado Novo regime.
In 1958, he became a member of
the Portuguese Communist Party, which at the time was an illegal
organization in Portugal.
In the morning of 26 September 1958, he was arrested by PIDE agents in his workplace in Hospital de São José, on the accusation of belonging to an illegal political party opposing the government.
He was kept imprisoned for 18 months. During his time in prison, he composed music in his head. According to some sources, people in the prison thought that Paredes was going insane, walking around his cell pretending to play the guitar, when in fact he was composing. After his release from prison, he was suspended from his job in the hospital and worked for some years as a delegate of medical propaganda.
After the Carnation Revolution in Portugal, like others who had been political prisoners during the Estado Novo regime, Paredes was seen as a hero. He disliked this status and preferred not to talk about his time in prison, saying that there were people who suffered more than him. He was reinstated to his previous job in the Hospital de São José shortly after the revolution.
Paredes remained a member of the Portuguese Communist Party until his death.
Paredes' first release was a self-titled EP in 1957. He was accompanied by Fernando Alvim on the classical guitar. After this first record, the musical partnership between Paredes and Alvim would last for more than 20 years.
During the 1960s, Paredes composed the soundtracks for numerous Portuguese films. He composed the soundtrack for the 1963 film Os Verdes Anos, directed by Paulo Rocha. The piece Canção Verdes Anos, which is part of this soundtrack and was also included in his first studio album, became one of his most recognizable works.
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In 1970, he released a collaboration album with Cecília de Melo, titled Meu País.
In 1971, he released his second solo album, Movimento Perpétuo.
In 1982, his piece Danças Para Uma Guitarra was choreographed by Vasco Wellenkamp for the Gulbenkian Ballet.
In 1983, Paredes released the live album Concerto em Frankfurt, recorded in a concert at the Frankfurt Opera.
In 1986, he released a collaboration album with Portuguese composer António Victorino de Almeida, titled Invenções Livres.
In 1987, he released a new solo album, Espelho de Sons, which reached 3rd place in the Portuguese weekly album charts. It was followed by Asas Sobre o Mundo, in 1989.
In 1990, Paredes release an album with American jazz bassist Charlie Haden, titled Dialogues.
His last show was in October 1993 at the Aula Magna, in Lisbon, accompanied by Luísa Amaro.
After retiring from music and public life, he releases two more albums from previously unreleased material: Na Corrente (1996), containing pieces recorded between 1969 and 1973 at the Valentim de Carvalho studios, and Canção para Titi (2000), with recordings from 1993.
In December 1993, Paredes was diagnosed with myelopathy. The disease forced Paredes to stop playing guitar, thus ending his career as a musician. He was interned at the Fundação-Lar Nossa Senhora da Saúde, in Campo de Ourique, Lisbon, until his death.
Paredes died on 23 July 2004, in Lisbon. Following his death, the Portuguese government declared one day of national mourning in his honour. He lays buried at the Prazeres Cemetery, in Lisbon.
More information: Independent
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