As a conductor SimonWright has earned universalrespect and acclaim for hisinterpretations of wide-ranging and of challengingorchestral and choral reper-toire. Throughout his pro-fessional career, whichembraces roles as organist,accompanist. arranger andteacher, he has becomeestablished as a musician ofenormous integrity, winningthe admiration of musi-cians. audiences and criticsalike.

In the UK, Simon Wrighthas conducted many Britishorchestras including thePhilharmonia, BBC Phil-harmonic. Royal LiverpoolPhilharmonic, English Nor-thern Philharmonia, North-ern Sinfonia, ManchesterCamerata and NorthernChamber Orchestra. Aprize-winner in the 1986Leeds Conducting Com-petition, Simon Wright hasbeen Conductor andArtistic Adviser of theLeeds Festival Chorus since1975 and Musical Directorand Principal Conductor ofthe Citv of York GuildhallOrchestra since 1992. Hehas also been MusicalDirector of the BrittenSingers since 1992, a choirwhich he established as oneof the most versatile choralgroups in the UK. He isdeeply committed to themusic of the 20th and 21stcenturies and has conduct-ed many orchestral andchoral premieres including,recently, Dominic Muldow-ney’s The Fall of Jerusalem.In March 2005 he will con-duct the second perform-ance and British premiereof Sir Peter MaxwellDavies’ Canticum Cantico-rum with the Leeds FestivalChorus and BBC Philhar-monic.

Simon Wright has touredextensively within Europe,

appearing at many majorfestivals, including Edin-burgh, and made hisAmerican debut in NewYork in 1986. Recordings,both as conductor and key-board player, with JohnWallace OBE, the WallaceCollection and With thePhilharmonia form a majorpart of his discographywhich includes recordingson the EMI, Nimbus, Coll-ins Classics, GMN and IMPMasters labels. His mostrecent European engage-ments have included recor-dings and concerts with thePhilharmonisches Staats-orchester Bremen and thePhilharmonie und Kammer-philharmonie des Mittel-deutschen Rundfunks Leip-zig.

In May 2003, he conduct-ed the English ChamberOrchestra at the ClassicalBrit Awards held in theRoyal Albert Hall andbroadcast on national tele-vision. In September 2003he conducted the sameorchestra in a Gala concertat Shakespeare's Globe inaid of the Prince's Trust. InJune he made his debutwith the BBC ScottishSymphony Orchestra, con-ducting a recording ofBritish trumpet concertoswith John Wallace.

Born in Sunderland,Simon Wright was educatedat Chetham's School, Man-chester and at the RoyalManchester College ofMusic. A regular accompa-nist of the Halle Choir,often working with Sir JohnBarbirolli, he won, at theage of 16, a scholarship tothe Royal Manchester Col-lege, and four years laterwas appointed Organist ofthe Benedictine foundationat Ampleforth Abbey inNorth Yorkshire.

SIMONSIMONWRIGHTWRIGHT

The English ChamberOrchestra, formed in 1960,enjoys an international rep-utation as one of theworld’s most celebratedensembles. The Orchestraundertakes a busy annualschedule of concert appear-ances, including its presti-gious London series andregular concerts for itsPatron, HRH The Princeof Wales.

Overseas tours take placevirtually every month, andsince its first foreign tourthe ECO has performed inalmost 500 cities across theglobe. Recent tours havetaken the Orchestra toGermany, Finland, Italy,Poland, Spain, France,Bermuda, the Far East, andIndia. Earlier this year theOrchestra took part in oneof its regular music cruisesin the Caribbean, perform-ing alongside a distin-guished array of guestsoloists including JoshuaBell, Christine Brewer,Yuri Bashmet and StevenIsserlis; and last month sawthe ECO performing withSarah Chang in Austria,Hungary and Croatia.Later in 2004 the Orchestrawill tour with Vladimir

EnglishChamber Orchestra

Ashkenazy, Leon Fleischerand Sumi Jo.

The Orchestra’s last tour toBrazil was in the early1990s (with PinchasZukerman), and a returnvisit is planned for 2006.

In 2000 the Orchestraappointed Ralf Gothoni asPrincipal Conductor, and in2003 Roy Goodmanbecame Principal GuestConductor. Both artistsregularly perform with theECO in London, whilstGothoni will tour theOrchestra to Japan andGermany this summer andGoodman will conduct aSpanish tour in theautumn.

Alongside its concert andrecording work, the ECO isproud of its outreach pro-gramme CLOSEENCOUNTERS whichtakes music into communi-ties around the UK andoverseas.

Full details of the ECO’sactivities can be found atwww.englishchamerorchestra.co.uk

21st INTERNATIONAL GUITAR SERIESPresented in association with THE BRAZILIAN EMBASSY

CARLOS BARBOSA-LIMA, Guitarand the

ENGLISH CHAMBER ORCHESTRAConducted by

SIMON WRIGHTTUESDAY 11th MAY 2004 at 7.45pm

QUEEN ELIZABETH HALL, LONDON SE1 8XX

PROGRAMME

SAUDADE DO BRASIL, (UK Premiére)arr. by Paulo Jobim (2004)for guitar & small orchestra

MEU AMIGO RADAMÉS, (UK Premiére)arr. by Paulo Jobim

for guitar, strings & woodwindsO BOTO, (UK Premiére)

arr. by Byron Yasui for orchestraANTONIO CARLOS JOBIM

(1927-1994)

AMAZONIAarr. & cadenza by Carlos Barbosa-Lima,

orchestrated by the composerCHÔRO e BATUQUE

arr. by Carlos Barbosa-Lima for guitarorchestrated by the composer

LAURINDO ALMEIDA(1917-1995)

INTERVAL

A LENDA do CABOCLOarr. by Carlos Barbosa-Lima for guitar

orchestrated by Byron YasuiHEITOR VILLA-LOBOS

(1887-1959)

CONCERTO de COPACABANAAllegro Moderato

Calmo e ExpressivoRitmado

RADAMÉS GNATTALI(1906-1998)

Presented by JRM MONROY MANAGEMENTKindly visit our Website at

www.laccs.com

LATIN AMERICAN AND CARIBBEANCULTURAL SOCIETY

SECOND PART OF 20th ANNIVERSARY PROGRAMME SAUDADE DO BRASIL

(UK Premiére) arr. by Paulo Jobim (2004)

for guitar and small orchestra MEU AMIGO RADAMÉS

(UK Premiére)arr. by Paulo Jobim

for guitar, strings & woodwinds O BOTO

(UK Premiére) orchestrated by Byron Yasui

ANTONIO CARLOS JOBIM(1927-1994)

Antonio Carlos Jobim grew up accompa-nied by two uncles who played the guitar,one in the Brazilian samba and choro styleand the other, played more classical com-posers such as Bach, Sor, Albéniz andTárrega. His early training was strictly clas-sical playing the piano as his main instru-ment. (Ron Purcell, California State Uni-versity, Northridge). His extraordinary out-put includes a great number of songs, ofthese, a significant number found interna-tional acclaim such as, Desafinado and TheGirl from Ipanema. When he was inter-viewed by Brian Hodel he said that ‘popu-lar’ and serious music should not be con-sidered as two separate and distinct ‘turfs’because when a good ‘pop’ song is innova-tive and meets high standards not only doesit survive but tends to be assimilated intothe classical tradition in time. In fact manyof his songs have become favourite piecesin where other musicians are able to elabo-rate intrincate arrangements.

The bossa nova movement began in 1958in Brazil around a large group of perform-ers and composers including AntônioCarlos Jobim, Joao Gilberto, Nara Leao,Vinicius de Moraes, Carlos Lyra, RobertoMenescal, Jhonny Alf, Roberto Carlos andmay others who directed themselves toredefine popular music in Brazil. The bossanova have an all embracing character,introducing innovations in melody, whichwas more elaborate, less traditional in itsharmony and much more intimate in itsinterpretation with a most characteristicBrazilian rhythm. So Brazilian music enter-ed a phase of intense creativity.

We all know that there is one name whois instantly associated with bossa nova andin this respect Carlos Barbosa-Lima com-mented… “To speak of Antonio CarlosJobim one has to think of him as a truegenius, who not only helped creating themuch acclaimed bossa nova style, but influ-enced more than a generation of com-posers in Brazil and in other countries. Hismusic was incorporated by great jazz artistsinto their standard repertoire.”… He con-tinues further comments on the composer'sSaudade do Brasil (Longing for Brazil) bysaying it was written in 1975 with an origi-nal orchestration by Claus Ogerman for alarge orchestra including choir, andadded… “I worked with Jobim the conceptof arranging this piece for guitar and smallorchestra in a chamber music format. Heliked the idea and we drafted elements foran arrangement which was finally done byhis son Paulo Jobim (himself a skilled com-poser and arranger) in 1991 and revised in2004”. With regard to Meu Amigo RadamésCarlos Barbosa-Lima affirmed that… “is atribute by Jobim to his dear friend andmentor Radamés Gnattali who wrote it in1982 for piano. It has been arranged byPaulo Jobim for guitar, strings and wood-winds. This is the premiére of this arrange-ment. With regard to the last of Jobim'spieces O Boto, the song is based on a leg-end from the Amazon, about an enchanteddolphin with the power to be transformedinto a man to make love to young women.It was written in 1977 and it is a descriptivework with a colourful orchestration byByron Yasui (Hawaiian composer) whichgive the piece a new dimension.

AMAZONIA arr. & cadenza by Carlos Barbosa-Lima

orchestrated by the composer CHÔRO e BATUQUE

arr by Carlos Barbosa-Lima for guitar orchestrated by the composer

LAURINDO ALMEIDA(1917-1995)

There are few musicians with the reputa-tion to match guitarist and composerLaurindo Almeida He was a classical musi-cian also a jazz performer, popular virtuosowho excelled in every area. He played asorchestra soloist, recitalist recording artist,Almeida did it all superbly. But going backin his life we have found that in 1932 theState of Sao Paulo went to a civil war and ofcourse, Almeida joined the army and whilstwounded met “Garoto” (Aníbal AugustoSardinha). The friendship was going to lastfor life. Garoto helped him to find a posi-tion in one of the leading radio stations inBrazil and by 1947 he had achieved his goalto become top guitarist along with Garoto.The tune that made it for him was JhonnyPeddlar and with a fat royalty cheque in hispocket he decided to go to the USA andtravelled to California in 1947, in where heput his talent to work: he wrote scores formotion pictures, was member of the StanKenton's jazz orchestra and entered the listof recording artists with Capitol Records.He founded the Laurindo Almeida Quar-tet formed by Bud Shank, (saxophonist)Stan Getz, Ray Brown and himself. Theyplayed arrangements which at this timeAlmeida called samba jazz, the precursor ofwhat was going to be the bossa nova. Bybringing the Brazilian samba and Americanjazz together a new twist or style was creat-ed. He was a composer of over 200 compo-sitions, he recorded over 80 albums andwas the winner of 5 Grammy Awards forrecording excellence, and also was an earlypioneer of the music of Radamés Gnattalihe recorded his Concerto de Copacabana in1966.

Answering LACCS call Laurindo, cameto London to play duos with CarlosBarbosa-Lima and trios with GaudencioThiago de Mello and to supervise threesongs he had orchestrated: Lobiana,(European premiére) Chôro e Batuque, forguitar and orchestra, (also European pre-miére) and Amazonia. The concert wasorganised in association with the BrazilianEmbassy and was held on 3rd April 1992, atSt John’s Smith Square. The soloist wasCarlos Barbosa-Lima with the Wren Orch-estra of London, conducted by MartynBrabbins. At the beginning of the secondhalf, we paid tribute to Laurindo and pre-sented to him the first “1992, LACCSAward” created to honour musicians whohave consistently promoted Latin Ameri-can music. We had a full house and weenjoyed a programme entirely dedicated toBrazilian music. It was a memorableevening. We have fulfilled our goal! A con-cert review commented… “Now at 75years, Almeida still plays effectively andwith an easy, laidback rhythm”… ColinCooper, Classical Guitar, April 1992.

He married Deltra Eamon, a Canadianlyric soprano and their union added an-other dimension to Laurindo's professionalcareer as accompanist on recordings andconcerts. They made their home inSherman Oaks, California. LACCS invitedthem to perform again in a programmeentitled Brazilian Reflections. LaurindoAlmeida, guitar and Deltra EamonAlmeida, voice. The evening was held onFriday 28th May 1993 at the Wigmore Hall.Most of the songs were arranged byLaurindo and published by BrazillanceMusic Publishing he founded in 1962, whichmade available the original compositions ofGnattali, Garoto etc. We had another out-standing evening with an original approach,with Didi's velvet voice and the guitar play-

Programme Notes

ANTONIO CARLOS JOBIM LAURINDO ALMEIDA HEITOR VILLA-LOBOS RADAMÉS GNATTALIand A. C. JOBIM

LACCS AWARD 1992VINICIUS DE MORAES ANÍBAL AUGUSTO SARDINHA(GAROTO)

ERNESTO NAZARÉT

ing of Laurindo they transported us away in a jour-ney of Brazilian magical music with works byHeitor Villa Lobos, Emesto Nazareth, AlfredoVianna, Jaime Ovalle, Ari Barroso, Baden Powell,Luiz Floriano Bonfá, Antonio Carlos Jobim andmany others.

Tonight's concert includes Amazonia a piecewritten for guitar, string orchestra and percussion.by Laurindo whilst he was member of the Kenton'sjazz orchestra. It was premiéred by himself as asoloist to great acclaim at Carniege Hall in 1950.The following piece Chôro e Batuque was also pre-miéred at Carnegie Hall in 1985. It was re-arrangedfor the present concert with a solo introduction andan interlude variation by Carlos Barbosa Lima, hekept the original orchestration, adding… “encour-aged by Almeida's enthusiasm I decided to arrangeChôro e Batuque."

INTERVAL

A LENDA do CABOCLO(Legend of a mixed Brazilian popular musician)

arr. by Carlos Barbosa-Lima for guitarorchestrated by Byron Yasui HEITOR VILLA-LOBOS

(1887-1959)

The first instances of nationalism in Brazilianmusic appeared in the XIX. Brasilio Itiberè daCunha (1848-1913 wrote “Sertaneja” in 1869; itwas the first erudite piece to use citations fromfolklore, interesting to note is that most of the com-posers at the time finished their education inEurope but they did not distance themselves fromthe use of elements of the folklore. Within thisframe we have this extraordinary Brazilian musi-cian Heitor Villa-Lobos who introduced us to aBrazilian musical language taken from the mostdiverse points of Brazil he personally visited in1912. But he was based in Río de Janeiro the city inwhere he was born. He studied at the NationalInstitute of Music in his home town, but it has to besaid, that his compositional style did not conformedto academic norms. His music was always personaland idiosyncratic. By 1923 he won a scholarship tostudy in Europe. He spent several years in Parisfrom 1929 until 1930; here he was most influencedby the works of Stravinsky and J S Bach and the lat-est gave him the inspiration to write a cycle of nineBachianas brasileiras pieces which contained tintsof Baroque forms recreated with Brazilian flavour.He also wrote his Chôros series.

Afterwards, on his return to Brazil he wasoffered a series of academic posts allowing him todo valuable work in reforming musical education.He founded the Conservatorio Nacional de CantoOrfeónico and the Brazilian Academy of Music forhe was convinced that “music” is one of the mostpowerful means for the creation of national identi-ty. So he designed a complete system of musicaleducation for generations of Brazilians based onBrazil’s rich musical heritage rooted in a deep andalways explicit patriotism. He wrote choral musicfor huge choirs of school children which were adap-

tations of folk material. He is still remembered withgreat affection for his legacy in the Brazil of today.Furthermore, he went to the USA in 1944 to con-duct his works with great success and as a result hewas commissioned with new works by Americanorchestras and by this time he wrote in 1945 thescore of a film entitled The Green Mansions. Hewas a prolific composer the most known of hisworks are Serenades for voice and piano, Cirandas(nursery music), Douze Etúdes pour la Guitare, FivePreludes, etc., in all of them he utilized techniquesand composition forms that do not counter in theleast the originality which marked his works that isto say he created a language of his own.

A Lenda do Caboclo was written in 1920 as apiano piece and was re-arranged in 1922 for a stringorchestra double woodwind, two horns, harp andpercussion. The piece has a mystical quality from thehinterlands, in where the caboclo (mixed ofPortuguese and native Indian blood) speaks andsings his legends. The piece to be performed intonight’s concert is for guitar and orchestra.

CONCERTO de COPACABANAAllegro Moderato

Calmo e ExpressivoRitmado

RADAMÉS GNATTALI(1906-1998)

Radamés Gnattali was a fine pianist, arranger, gui-tarist band leader and composer of both eruditeand popular music, born in Pôrto Alegre he latermoved to Río de Janeiro. The son of a musicteacher he had the gift of writing music well aheadof his time. His career extended for almost 60 yearsduring which inspired several generations of musi-cians. He came from a musical family's backgroundwho had high hopes for him to become a concertpianist. He begun life as the son of Italian parentsand ended it as a Brazilian master, for he foundfame as an adoptive carioca child. It was in PôrtoAlegre that Radamés won his first prize in music, atthe age of nine in 1915; it was presented to him byThe Italian Consulate, in merit of conducting withsuccess a band of six musicians with music arrangedby himself. His first job consisted in playing, piano,guitar and cavaquino accompanying film sessions atthe Colombo cinema and playing in differentbands. By this time he was writing his first compo-sitions strictly classical but with strong nationalisticinfluence.

He admired Ernesto Nazarét, official pianist atthe Odeón cinema who was one of the mostrespected composers at the time. He continued hisstudies in Pôrto Alegre and by 1923 he was therecipient of the Medalha Araújo Vianna (goldmedal). In 1924 and 1926 he worked tireless travel-ling between Pôrto Alegre and Río de Janiero giv-ing concerts or as member of bands playing indances, cinemas, theatres and radios and formedhis Quarteto de Cordas Henrique Oswald whichturned to be one of the best groups of Brazilianchamber music and as such they toured all over RíoGrande do Soul. His debut as a composer was givenat the Sao Pedro Theatre in where he presented

two Preludes for piano with great success. We cansay that a turning point on Radamés life was meet-ing in 1925 Luciano Perrone, percussionist anddrummer who became his dearest friend for morethan fifty years. At Perrone's suggestion he startedmaking his own arrangements using a variety ofpercussion instruments. And the orchestratedsamba was born, he used wind instruments or har-mony for strings with a balanced rhythm, therefore,invented his own orchestral language which was notdone before.

He acquired the nickname of Radar when work-ing as pianist and arranger at Radio Nacional inwhere he became Music Director (1940) in Río deJaneiro. He also gained fame by recording popularmusic, but he considered himself firstly, a neo-clas-sic nationalist musician and in second place acavaquinista and producer. Henrique Cazes, mem-ber of Camerata Carioca, founded to record a newversion of Suite Retratos originally written for Jacódo Bandolim brought him back to fame again in1979. As a composer he was self-taught andparticularly successful in writing popular music andscores for film. He was a generous man who wrotemusic for any musician who played well an instru-ment without keeping the original partiture whichwas usually given away as presents. A particulardetail was that, he wrote vertically, for instance anarranger writes first the melody and afterwards thebaixo and harmonies etc., but Radamés wroteeverything at the same time. Another anecdote:when he was due to perform at Marcelo's he wentto a rehearsal and, apparently absentmindedly, hememorized the out of tune keys; when the per-formance was on, he substituted the out of tunekeys for other ones: the piano sounded perfect. It isinteresting to mention that in the opinion of RafaelRabello, what Villa-Lobos did for Brazilian folk orrural music, Radamés did it for Brazilian urbanfolk.

The Concerto de Copacabana was written in l956at the pick of his writing career and he dedicated itto Laurindo Almeida who recorded it on CapitalRecords nearly forty years ago. The piece wasinspired in the then wealthy resort beach of thesame name. It was the time when new rhythmswere coming out and when bossa-nova was mostpopular. Concerto do Copacabana was written inthe traditional style but incorporating many inno-vative ideas. The light string orchestration hasdelightful dialogues, added by colourful timpanieffects.

Just before he turned 80 years old suffered twocerebral haemorrages, falling into coma for nearlytwo years; his nephew Roberto Gnattali said… “Hedid not deserve this, he died when his output was atits highest”… He remembered Radamés lastwords… “Porra, Roberto, agora que tava ficandobom”…

Information for Radamés Gnattali notes obtainedfrom Samba & Chôro Servicos Interativos LTD

© J. Sylvester, LACCS, 2004