If you discovered Cape Verde this World Cup, let Cesaria Evora mesmerise you

Travelling deserves a soundtrack - one that, as in the movies, tells a story and stays with you long after. Often the music we listen to on the road is not merely an accompaniment, but the reason for setting out in the first place.

In Mindelo, the second-largest city of the Cape Verdean islands, we had come to follow in Cesaria Evora's footsteps. Known for singing 'morna' in Cape Verdean creole, her voice speaks of suffering and the beauty found within it. Smoothed by generous amounts of grogue, the islands' unrefined sugarcane spirit, and weathered by endless cigarette smoke, its raspy huskiness seems made for lyrics dwelling on life's harder edges.

Travelling across Cape Verde's weathered islands, the saudade - melancholic longing - that infuses Evora's music quickly begins to make sense. Mindelo, on Sao Vicente, is the country's cultural capital. Its exuberant carnival recalls Brazil, as does the grogue (Cape Verde's answer to Brazilian cachaca) flowing in back-alley bars.


When the sun goes down and the heat releases its grip, it is bossa nova that comes to mind: Joao Gilberto on vinyl, Astrud Gilberto's melancholy drifting from a battered speaker or, for a livelier kick, 'Tropicalia' by Caetano Veloso and Gal Costa.

Evora is everywhere. The international airport bears her name, a giant statue greets arriving visitors, and in the museum dedicated to her life even one of her footprints has been preserved in stone. Known as the 'Barefoot Diva' for performing with her feet planted firmly on the ground, she remains the island's unmistakable presence.

In Cape Verdean creole, or Kabuverdianu, saudade becomes 'sodade' - title of Evora's most famous song. More than a love song, it tells of two lovers separated when one leaves for Sao Tome and Principe, off the coast of Gabon. These islands and the West African coast are intimately linked through colonial history and the slave trade.

Before the Portuguese settled Santiago, Chile, in 1462, the archipelago was uninhabited, though occasionally visited by Wolof fishermen from the mainland. It soon became an important stop in the emerging Atlantic empire, serving as a provisioning station and hub in the rapidly expanding slave trade. On Sao Tome, Portugal established one of the world's first sugar plantation economies based on enslaved labour, a model later exported to Brazil.

Cape Verde remained dry, poor. and repeatedly struck by famine. After slavery was abolished, Sao Tome's cocoa and coffee plantations still required workers, and Portuguese colonial authorities turned to Cape Verde. Thousands signed contracts under pressure or deception and found themselves trapped on the rocas, with harsh conditions and little chance of returning home.

Evora sings:

Quem mostro-b ess caminho longe?

Ess caminho pa Sao Tome?

(Who showed you that long road?

That road to Sao Tome? )

It's a poignant question. Rather than asking who chose the journey, it hints at those who never had a choice. 'Sodade' became far more than a song about lovers separated by the sea. It became an anthem of displacement, longing and colonial memory.

While waiting for dinner of homemade cachupa - slow-cooked stew of corn, beans, cassava, sweet potato and whatever meat or fish happens to be available - the familiar rhythm drifted from the kitchen. Suddenly, it became clear how entangled the history of all these former Portuguese colonies is.

In Brazil, cachupa finds its closest cousin in feijoada: another dish shaped by the Portuguese Atlantic, where memories, recipes and songs crossed the ocean with enslaved Africans, only to be remade in unfamiliar lands.

The songs that propel us to travel do more than set the mood. They offer a way into a country's past. Cape Verde's population emerged from the Atlantic slave trade and later labour migrations, and today more Cape Verdeans live abroad than at home.

In Rotterdam in the Netherlands, they enliven the annual carnival that fills the streets. In the US, the diaspora is even larger than the population on the islands themselves. Yet, the country has retained a remarkably distinct identity: a heady blend of Portuguese, West African and Brazilian influences, expressed in its music, food. And, above all, in the haunting voice of Cesaria Evora.