Sétima Legião

A standout Portuguese rock band, active from 1982 when it was formed by friends Pedro Oliveira, Rodrigo Leão and Nuno Cruz. They named the band Sétima Legião after the Roman Seventh Legion sent to Lusitânia in the first century A.D.. With Pedro Oliveira (vocals and guitar), Rodrigo Leão (bass and keys), Nuno Cruz (drums, percussion), Gabriel Gomes (accordion), Paulo Tato Marinho (bagpipes, flute), Ricardo Camacho (keys), Paulo Abelho (percussion, samplers), Francisco Ribeiro de Menezes (letters, backing vocals). Today, Pedro Oliveira is lawyer and the General Manager of a non-profit organization, GDA, dedicated to the performers' rights collective management, Rodrigo Leão who also founded the Madredeus follows his international solo career notably as soundtrack composer, Gabriel Gomes as musician in some other music projects (Madredeus, Fandango) as much as Paulo Abelho (Golpe de Estado, BCN e Cindy Kat) along the work of instructor and sound engineer/designer and Paulo Tato Marinho in the bagpipes and hornpipe ethno-domains from his strong northern influence by father side and his Galician-Portuguese cultural roots. Ricardo Camacho, the soul of "os Sétima" as the band is called by their legion of fans, died of lung cancer (July 4th, 2018). As medical doctor beyond his music career, he was a distinguished physician devoted to HIV and virology research with relevant work in the scientific community too. Francisco Ribeiro de Menezes is diplomat and Ambassador of Portugal in Berlin, as of 2020. In 2012, they celebrated their 30th anniversary with a live concert (May 4th) at the Coliseu dos Recreios in Lisbon. In 1994, they split the stage with the English band The Stranglers to complete the opening act assignment in a live concert in Coimbra (Portugal) recorded in video on May 12th. The film producer Emanuel AG, also from Galician-Portuguese background and who produced the official concert video Sétima Legião: Live in Concert (1994) of their memorable live performance in Coimbra (May 12th, 1994), considers them as one of the most representative contributions from the local music scene to comprehend a whole generation post-revolution (the Carnation Revolution / 25 April 1974 military coup) in their legacy with their past of nearly nine centuries of history as country, as well as the Celtic past (the name of Portugal itself is partly of Celtic origin) through the Portuguese diaspora overseas then and still today.