Biography
The multifaceted Ana Lains has a career spanning more than 25 years, having visited over 30 countries and performed more than 500 concerts in Portugal and abroad.
In 2020, she celebrated 20 years of her career, and the occasion was marked with a sold-out concert at the Black and Silver Hall of the Estoril Casino on 31 January, surrounded by friends such as Ivan Lins, Luís Represas, and Mafalda Arnauth. The concert was recorded and released in May 2021, entering directly at number one on the national sales chart in Portugal.
Over two and a half decades, the singer has built a discreet but unquestionably solid and self-sufficient career.
In Greece, they called her “Diva of a different Fado”.
In France, they called her “Virtuoso of the stage”.
In Portugal, she likes to be known as the “Colourful Singer” and is considered one of the most beautiful voices in the Portuguese language. Colourful because of the colours of a country that is her great passion, and which have coloured Ana Lains' music since 1999, the year she became a professional singer after winning the “Great Fado Evening” at the Coliseu dos Recreios.
Her roots lie in Fado and Traditional Portuguese music, but she goes beyond that. In 2006, with her debut album “Sentidos”, she was considered one of the great revelations of the year in Portuguese music by names such as João Gobern and Carlos do Carmo. “Songlines” magazine highlighted the singer's thoroughly contemporary approach to fado.
Her international profile took on a new dimension in 2009 when Boy George, winner of awards such as the Grammy, Tony and Brit Awards, invited Ana Lains to collaborate on the song “Amazing Grace”, explaining his choice by saying that he considered the singer to have a sublime voice.
In 2010, “QUATRO CAMINHOS” was released, an album widely acclaimed by international critics. In the Netherlands, “Jazzism” magazine referred to the album as true world music from Portugal, and “VPro Gids” spoke of the singer's elegance and natural command of her voice, naming the album one of the 10 best world music albums of the year. In England, the “Daily Planet” agrees, highlighting her pure and powerful voice.
In 2012, following critical acclaim for her latest work, Ana Laíns performed for the first time in the Netherlands on a tour of five sold-out concerts, with special highlights at De Doelen (Rotterdam) and the Tropen Theatre (Amsterdam).
Highlights of 2014 include an invitation from the President of the Portuguese Republic, Mr. Cavaco Silva, to attend the World Poetry Day celebrations at the Belém Palace, and an invitation to represent Portuguese culture at a dinner hosted for German President Joachim Glauck at the Ajuda National Palace. In 2014, the singer was invited by the artist Cristina Rodrigues to produce the closing concert of the exhibition “My Country Through Your Eyes”, which took place in the Noble Hall of the National Museum of Archaeology.
In 2015, because of her work in promoting and performing traditional and emerging portuguese music, Ana served as ambassador for the “Celebration of 8 centuries of Portuguese Language”. The finale of this ephemeris was a sold-out closing concert at Lisbon’s prestigious Belém Cultural Center, featuring musical luminaries from eight portuguese-speaking countries, such as Ivan Lins, Aline Frazão and Paulo de Carvalho.
These celebrations were noticed outside of Portugal and brought about a pedagogical tour in the United States, where she performed several concerts, and gave workshops on Fado and the portuguese language in some of the most important North American universities.
The success of this tour led to a new invitation, and she returned in 2016 for the prestigious “Lowell Folk Fest”, where her performance was considered one of the festival’s best. That year culminated with an invitation from the Portuguese Embassy in Ankara and Camões Institute, to open the prestigious “Sefika Kutluer” festival in Ankara, Turkey, to where she returned in 2017, for an artistic residency at the magnificent St. Regis Istanbul.
At the end of 2017, “PORTUCALIS” was released, and the album earned the singer nominations in the categories of “Best Portuguese Singer 2017”, “Best Song 2017” and “Best Concert 2017”, for her performance at Casa da Música in Porto.
It was also considered one of the top 10 albums of the year by the publications in Sweden and Spain. The Belgian magazine “Rootstime” said that at 38 years old, “Ana Laíns has categorically confirmed her identity and released her best album to date”. In the Netherlands, “Mixed World Music” referred to the singer as the personification of Portuguese identity. The album is a journey through portuguese language and ethnography, and features renowned artists, Ivan Lins, Luís Represas, Mafalda Arnauth and Filipe Raposo.
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In 2018, “PORTUCALIS” was heard at more than 30 concerts in Portugal, Spain, Sweden, France, Holland, Turkey, Tunisia, Romania and Poland. Concerts where Ana Laíns, invariably, left her mark as a different kind of singer, presenting a global journey through the culture of Portugal. One highlight was the closing concert of the Cascais “Festas do Mar”, which was conceived and produced in its entirety by the singer in partnership with the municipality and the Cascais Symphonic Orchestra. At this concert, Lusophony was at the core of a memorable evening that brought together on the same stage Fafa de Belém, Luís Represas, Stewart Sukuma, Paulo Flores, Karyna Gomes, Lura, Tonecas Prazeres and Piki Pereira, representing the 8 portuguese-speaking countries.
In 2019, Ana saw her success confirmed with a vast tour that took in most major portuguese cultural events, namely the “Artes à Rua Festival” (Évora), the “Sons da Terra Festival” (Oeiras), the “Seixal Fado Festival Food Fest”, “FicaVouga” (Sever do Vouga) and the “Leiria Music Festival”, where she performed accompanied by the Beiras Philharmonic Orchestra, as a guest of Ivan Lins.
At the invitation of Júlio Isidro she was part of the select line-up for a concert celebrating the 45th anniversary of the 25th of April revolution, produced by RTP, portuguese state television. A subsequent international tour visited Barcelona, Madrid, Seville, Zaragoza, Zamora, Bucharest and Baku, with a highlight being the “International Music Festival” in Izmir (Turkey), which successfully presented a portuguese singer for the first time in its history.
2021 turned out to be the year of the singer’s consecration, with the success of the new album celebrating 20 years of her career, which went directly to number 1 in the National Top Sales ranking, and a national and international tour with more than 30 dates in countries such as Croatia (where she performed at the National Theatre in Zagreb), Lithuania (Sofijos Festivalis), Ibiza (Festival Nits de Tanit), Turkey (Ankara Opera, invited by the Symphonic Orchestra of the Turkish presidency) or Brazil (CCBB concert hall of Brasília, at the International Congress of the Portuguese and Spanish Language).
In 2022, and following the success of her tour of Brazil in November 2021, Ana Laíns returns to this country for her debut in Belo Horizonte, and is invited by the Portuguese Embassy in Brazil and the Camões Institute Brazil to record the concert celebrating Portugal Day, Camões and Portuguese Communities in partnership with Brazilian singer Fafá de Belém.
That same year, after RTP2, a channel dedicated to culture, highlighted their live concert at Casino Estoril, the tour continued with around 25 dates across the country, Germany, Romania, and Spain.
In 2023, the singer founded Mátria Mundi, a cultural content creation and production company, and established the Estoril Folk Fest in partnership with the prestigious Casino Estoril. She performed for the first time in Cape Verde at the invitation of the Portuguese Embassy and the Camões Institute in Praia and Mindelo.
In April 2024, he will perform in the concert “Canções da Liberdade” (Songs of Freedom) with the António Saiote Ensemble, at the invitation of the latter, who is considered one of the greatest clarinetists in Portugal and worldwide. In May this year, she produced the concert “MULHERES DA LUSOFONIA” (Women of the Portuguese-speaking World) in partnership with the CPLP and the Brazilian Mission to the CPLP, in a joint idea with singer Fafá de Bélem. The concert was sold out at the Belém Cultural Centre and featured eight women from Portuguese-speaking countries, such as Anabela Aya, Lura, Karyna Gomes and Selma Uamusse.
2024 also became one of the singer's most fruitful years, as she had the opportunity to perform in some of the most prestigious programmes and concert halls around the world, notably at Sesc Palladium in Belo Horizonte, and at the renowned “Baroque Music Festival in Varazdin” (Croatia) as a worthy representative of Portugal.
In April 2025, she was invited by TV Galicia to represent Portugal and the Carnation Revolution in a programme entirely dedicated to the celebration of 25 April, and returned to Brazil at the invitation of the Brazil-Portugal Chamber of Commerce Federation for concerts as part of the celebration of Portugal Day and the Communities, performing in Belo Horizonte, Goiânia and Montes Claros. Also in 2025, he received a prestigious invitation from the Symphonic Band of the National Republican Guard to perform a joint concert at Casino Estoril, which was attended by senior officials from the GNR and the Portuguese government, notably the Minister of Internal Administration, Dr Maria Lúcia Amaral.
2025 was the year that saw the start of work on her next project “IDENTIDADE(S)”, which will be the result of close collaboration between the singer and Portuguese musicians and ethnographic groups from the 20 regions of mainland Portugal and its islands. The project will result in a double book/album, scheduled for release in the first quarter of 2027.