Rui Reininho's "Soñetos"

Last Friday, Livraria Lello was the scene of a rare encounter: Rui Reininho, the unmistakable voice of Portuguese music and now the author of Soñetos, met with Rui Couceiro, editor, writer and long-time admirer of Reininho, for a lyrical journey through the verses that have marked generations and are now concentrated in this collection.

Soñetos, published by Imprensa Nacional in the Letra Poema collection, is much more than an anthology of lyrics: it is an aesthetic and emotional testimony to the way in which the Portuguese language can be reinvented - word by word, rhyme by rhyme - by someone who has always made dissonance a popular gesture.

‘Rui [Reininho] has achieved what few others can: making difference a commonplace, the alternative a popular phenomenon.’

Rui Couceiro began the session with a clear statement: ‘Rui has achieved what few others can: making difference a commonplace, the alternative a popular phenomenon.’ For those who grew up listening to the GNR, like Couceiro himself, Reininho's writing was a school, an enigma and an inspiration. At the age of 8, even before he knew what a ‘fatuous fire’ or ‘white noise’ was, he was already trying to decipher the lyrics of Rock in Rio Douro, in a ritual of obsessive late afternoon listening.

Between memories and admiration, Couceiro evoked expressions that only Reininho could create: oxygenated witch, use you à la carte drenched in whipped cream, stereophonic bombardment, pseudo-mother, indiscreet screens - semantic constructions that ‘create atmospheres’, in his words. Atmospheres that defy conventional meaning and install a unique verbal musicality.

‘To name is to make real.’

Rui Reininho was, as usual, ironic, generous and profoundly brilliant. He told how his first album, in the 1970s, was entirely instrumental, made up of percussion and concrete music, long before he joined GNR. He recalled the influence of Jorge Lima Barreto, from Chiado to Piolho, and the Lisbon avant-garde that convinced him that ‘what he wrote had value’.

For Reininho, writing is a sacred gesture: ‘To name is to make real.’ And even when the words border on the nonsensical, they always contain a sharp thought, a social criticism or an intimate memory. Whether in themes such as Efetivamente, Dunas, USA or 1000991, what emerges is a poetics of surprise.

‘The book isn't everything,’ said Reininho, ‘but it's where everything can begin.’

Between readings and digressions, there was room for humour, tenderness and reverence - both for Reininho's career and for the power of the word. The session was also an ode to childhood, to the love of the Portuguese language and of books: ‘Books aren't everything,’ said Reininho, ‘but they are where everything can begin.’