It has been said that music is the universal language. To the musicians involved with Rua Das Pretas it is that and so much more. Their intimate performances transform strangers into family, songs into religious gospel and moments into magic. The collective captured this freedom of live performance with its recent release The Wine Album, available worldwide on all digital platforms.
Eponymous Review got the opportunity to ask founder Pierre Aderne and musician Brian Cullman about the genesis of the project and how Rua Das Pretas takes performers and listeners on a sonic journey unlike any other.
Laurie Fanelli: Let’s start with the basics. What is Rua das Pretas?
Brian Cullman: Rua Das Pretas is a street in Lisbon and is the street Pierre used to live on. But I think it’s also equivalent to “downtown,” or “off the grid,” it’s more than a location, it’s a state of mind. Come on, baby, let’s go downtown. Let’s go to the Rua das Pretas. But it’s a real location as well as a state of mind: it’s the place where fantasy and reality meet for a drink.
LF: Who are some of the musicians involved with the project?
BC: Tom Jobim, Amalia Rodriguez, Leonard Cohen, John Lennon, Curtis Mayfield, Gal Costa. But it’s not their fault. Most parents don’t know where their children go at night.
LF: Can you explain the appeal of a salon environment?
Pierre Aderne: It’s safe, and yet it’s unpredictable. You can close your eyes and feel for a moment that you could leave your family and run away with the circus. All the doors are open. But then you open your eyes and realize that you’re already in the middle of the ring, there’s no need to run. The circus is in your heart, and it’s not going to run away from you ever again.
BC: Most concerts have evolved into spectacles, a bit like Disney On Ice. There’s no room for spontaneity or for intimacy, you’re there to be wowed by the enormity of the experience, not the beauty. And as a member of the audience that leaves you out of the equation except as a customer. As a kid I used to go to little clubs and cafes where you could be a part of the creative process, you’d get to hear a song evolve from night to night. Jeff Buckley would change his set every night at Sin-é, some nights he’d throw away a song, just stumble through it, and the next he’d approach it from three directions at once, holding it up to the light to see how it could shine. And you’d go from being restless, waiting for him to get in tune, to having your heart broken into a million pieces in the course of five minutes. This is the sort of experience we have every night in a salon and in Rua das Pretas. We’re not looking for perfection but for magic.
LF: Congratulations on The Wine Album! How did this collaboration come together?
PA: It all began 14 years ago at 130 Rua Nascimento Silva, just in front of Tom Jobim’s house. I decided to invite musician friends over in memory of the gatherings Jobim and Nara Leão had in that street and also at Avenida Atlântica in Copacabana back in the 60s. We ended up doing that three times a week for years, and since I moved to Lisbon I’ve done the same…and back to NY where I met Brian and Hector. The idea of collecting people from your small tribe. When I decided to make a record, I called a dozen of these shamans, including Brian Cullman, Dirk Niepoort, Tanner Walle, Jesse Harris, Fred Martins, João Barradas and others to help finish the roof of the house .
BC: Pierre is a beachcomber, he walks up and down the shore picking up bits of driftwood, broken shells, maybe a starfish or a drunken sand crab, and he puts them together into a new and unexpected pattern. He finds musicians that don’t know each other and turns them into family. Sometimes it’s a deep and permanent connection, sometimes it’s just for one or two nights. But he allows people to find each other’s strengths and to support each other along the way.
LF: I understand the album is being released in conjunction with a cuvée produced by Niepoort Wines. How does the wine pair with the music?
BC: Wine is an integral part of most religious ceremonies. It’s part of the magic of transubstantiation, of taking the everyday and bringing the Holy Ghost into the equation. Why do you think they call it “spirits?”
PA: I met Dirk in the Douro Valley while I was performing at the Douro film festival and wine harvest with fado singer Cuca Roseta and filmmaker Carlos Saura. When I moved to Lisbon we needed wine for the gatherings at my place, so I called Dirk, and he sent a case. Every week, a new winemaker friend showed up at my gathering in Rua das Pretas… Luis Cerdeira – Soalheiro, who also produced a wine for Rua das Pretas that will be distributed this February with a download code for the album on the cork, and many others like Quinta Maria Izabel, Tiago Dias, Antonio Maçanita, Miguel Louro…
LF: Community seems to be at the heart of Rua das Pretas? What do you enjoy most about making and sharing music with others?
BC: It’s very hard to talk about without sounding corny or sentimental. I go from feeling like I’m being swept away by the current to realizing I’m a part of the river. How wonderful is that? I think for all of us involved, we go back and forth between being a member of the audience to being in the band. We get to be a part of something bigger than ourselves.
PA: The fact it is always a surprise and unpredictable. Each night has a different moon to light up the stars in a new sky. Collaborations, new songs, storytelling, meeting new people, observing lovers taking charge of the night: “pour me a glass …a glass of trouble …pour me a glass, make it double.” Lisbon became together with Rua das Pretas the capitol of Portuguese language music, Lusophone music. It is all there: bossas, sambas and cirandas from Brazil, mornas and funanas from Cabo Verde, cantes and fados from Portugal… all blended in a big pan to create a new taste, a new accent. It’s no longer important to know what country those singers come from, but just to know that they are all singing in Portuguese.
BC: Yes. Portuguese is the language of flowers, the language of lost love, missed trains and forgotten promises.
LF: How can someone get involved with Rua das Pretas’ gatherings?
PA: Any artist who has an empty glass is welcome… after a few bottles, after a few nights, we start to be family, and sharing music, sharing our stories could happen.
BC: After a few more nights, ANYTHING could happen.
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Hear what could happen for yourself by listening to The Wine Album on Spotify or anywhere digital music is found. More information is available at Ruadaspretas.com.