January on Cultura FM

Happy New Year!

Here are radio programs of interest from Sao Paulo's Cutural FM for January - listen here on the Internet. Times are local Sao Paulo times, one hour ahead of EST.

At 11:00 on January 7, Janos Starker performs the Fantasia for cello & orchestra. Eleazar de Carvalho conducts the Orquestra Sinfônica da Paraíba. This is from the excellent Brazilian Festival '88: A Brazilian Extravaganza CD on the Delos label, still available from Amazon.com.

The following day, again on the Cirandas program at 11:00, you can hear three relatively unfamiliar works from the great Choros series: the epic number 12, along with two witty chamber pieces: number 7 and 4.

At 12:00 on January 12th, the program Acervo Cultura presents "As notas são": "Da música brasileira. Série de 13 programas dedicados à composição erudita do Brasil. Em destaque: A CRIAÇÃO E A CRÍTICA (VILLA-LOBOS E FRANCISCO MIGNONE OS CRIADORES, CARLOS MAUL, E DOIS ANÔNIMOS OS CRÍTICOS). Idealização e apres.: Sérgio Vasconcellos Correa. Apoio de produção: João Antonio Batista. Produção: José Roberto Prazeres - 1990." I'll try listening to this, but I'm not sure if my extremely limited Portuguese will allow me to understand much.

At 11:00 on January 13, you can hear one of the best of Villa's Symphonies, his Sixth. This performance by Carl St. Clair and the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Stuttgart is also one of the best in the excellent cpo series of complete symphonies.

At 15:00 on January 27, the great String Trio is performed by the Ensemble Capriccio, from a 2001 Paulus CD. Also on the programme is a work by a composer I don't know, Amaral Vieira. His Quintet for piano and strings is op. 297, so there's a lot of Vieira out there to listen for in the future. The Villa-Lobos String Trio is repeated at 11:00 on January 30, along with a very interesting group of other works: New York Skyline for piano, the Dança do índio branco and Improviso em homenagem a Villa-Lobos by pianist João Carlos Assis.

Looking ahead to February, there's a short piece I'm looking forward to hearing. It's the Divertimento by the late José Vieira Brandão. Brandão, a close associate of Villa-Lobos and an excellent composer in his own right, performed many premieres of works by Villa-Lobos. He died in October of 2002. The Divertimento is performed by a chamber group of excellent Brazilian players: Andréa Ernest Dias (flute), Luiz Carlos Justi (oboe), José Botelho (clarinet), Philipp Doyle (trumpet) and Noel Devos (bassoon). Listen at 11:00 on February 5th.

On February 28 at 11:00, the rarely performed Introdução ao Choros for guitar and orchestra can be heard. This is from a highly recommended Ondine CD with the Finnish guitarist Timo Korhonen.

Good listening!