A portrait of Lisbon, saudade and the fado folk music of the city and its relationship with tourism. Henri Kisielewski is the 2019 recipient of the Joan Wakelin bursary, administrated in partnership with the Royal Photographic Society

Fado is Lisbon’s urban folk music, born in and around the brothels, alleyways and ​tascas ​of the city’s poorest neighbourhoods. Fado is to Lisbon what the Blues are to the Delta. Written records trace it back to the early 19th century, though some argue it is much older, connecting it to oral traditions imported from across the Portuguese empire.

At the heart of fado is ​saudade.​ This elusive word – apparently untranslatable from the original Portuguese – broadly refers to a sense of sorrow, of yearning, and a resigned desire for what once was. This is the underlying emotion of all fado and perhaps of Lisbon itself.