Friday, February 6, 2009

Villa-Lobos Documentary footage



This is really amazing - 10 minutes from a documentary on Villa-Lobos, with some great footage of Villa-Lobos home movies. Even though I can't understand the bulk of what's being said, it's nice to see Villa on video with Mindinha and other friends. Villa is as charming and self-confident as one imagined - I don't think I've ever seen someone as comfortable with himself and his world.


Nice also to see the late Anna Stella Schic, and Walter Burle Marx, Marlos Nobre, Turibio Santos, and Cesar Guerra Peixa. Also, it's great to see and hear Pixinguinha's choroes play "Cardinhoso".

1 comment:

  1. Hello, I've made a brief translation of what they say in this video to repay some of the wonderful work that you do in this blog!
    Good-bye!

    Here is the translation from this footage:
    - God has given us two ears for some reason:
    when the thrill (feeling) is huge and you can hear it, then you hear with two ears. When it's not that big, it comes to one ear, and goes out from the other.
    - Villa was unpredictable, a fellow with a multiple personality, he had imagination of a child, a teenager's boldness, and hability of a self-made man, that's what who have known him say. Emilío Berto de Carvalho(?) it's a poet, lyricist and Villa's researcher who, when was a child, was under the maestro's baton.
    Emilio says: - He was like a volcano, with it's eruptions. Incredible the impression he made on me, an angel, a demon in form of angel, he expelled a burst into your eyes.
    There goes narrator again:
    - The teacher Castro Filho is an artist, he was Villa's brother-in-law and close friend during twenty-three years.
    Castro Filho: - Villa Lobos had a likehood for the monumental(?), his cigars were the biggest of the world, the television that he bought on the US looked like a cinema screener, he learned to drive automobile, and the car he bought was a Dodge(?), within twelve seats, a presidential car.
    Narrator goes: - Anna Stella Schic is a concert pianist, and met Villa Lobos in the late 1940's in Paris, where she still lives, since then she became a great friend. And today is one of the main interprets of Villa in Europe.
    Anna Stella Schic: - It's was obvious that he was a unwilling person to trust in others, he was an indian to say the truth. I'm used to say, and I saw that and laughed about it, he had that big cigar, and in a certain way, before he met someone, he hid behind his cigar, looked from afar, with a huge smoke next to him, he kept staring until he felt that the person were worth to be trusted by him. That was the first contact with Villa.
    Narrator: Ahygara Vacira was Villa-Lobos' niece.
    Ahygara: - Call me everything, call me uncle Villa, call me Uncle (?), but don't call me Heitor. ( She makes a childlish voice ) Why Uncle? ( Makes a male voice ) Because Heitor is a dog's name.
    Narrator: The maestro Walter Burle Marx have knowm Villa in 1914 in Rio de Janeiro, he was responsible to bring Villa's music to the US, today he lives in Philadelphia.
    Walter Burle-Marx: - He didn't African music to influence Brazilian music. He used to say: No! We never had african influence in Brazilian music, I've been into Africa. I've been with Millor(?)(Millot?), and we've said that African music was influenced by French music..
    Narrator: - And this is Villa's Mindinha, Dona Arminda Neves, or Arminda Villa Lobos, or simply Lindinha (little beau), he was Villa's second spouse, despite they have never married, they lived together twenty-three years, the last years of Villa Lobos.
    Arminda: - He was a big child, everybody thought that, a very childlish soul, for everything he made puns (play with words), his made the worst of them, and his friends said: It's so unfunny!, laughing, and find horrible.
    Narrator>: He was born in a house from this quartier. In 5 march of 1887, he was a baby of seven months, and they said in those times that premature's destiny were always sucess. But most anything in Villa's life was certain or right. Even his birth date remained obscure for a long time, it was a chaotic fin de siecle, one year after Villa's birth, it was abolished slavery in Brazil, in 1889 was banned Monarchy, and proclaimed Republic. The national republicans, followers of positivist philosophy, from Auguste Comte, brought a climax of patriotic uproar to it's heights. Which didn't stopped artist and intelectuals to look for a national way of expressing. In the literature there was Olavo Bilac and Aluísio de Azevedo, in the music Alberto Neponucemo and Alexandre Lévi. But only later Villa, with his hability to notice big events, estabilished in the music the nationalist seed which were used in his child years. The maestro and composer Marlos Nobre , president of Music Council from UNESCO in Paris, talks about the importance of this national subject on Villa's work.
    Marlos Nobre: - It's important to know that him was a pionner to know that Brazil it's not Europe, Brazil is a great sponge, that absorbs influences and launches a new message to abroad and to brazilians.
    Narrator: - Villa's father was a intelectual man, former employer from National Library of Brazil. "Tu", nickname for Heitor, was a mischiveous boy, very young he had a kidney disturb and took a medicine made from Azul de bromotileno ( Blue of bromotileno or something).
    Ahyura: - "Tu" aproveitou and climbed our fence, in the neighbor's side were white chickens, those beautiful chickens ( She says the chicken's specimen, but I don't know how to write), and then after he climbed the fence, he made pee in the chickens, turning all of them in blue.
    Narrator: - But in those times a family's breeding was rigid, they believed that a personality of youngs should be forged with discipline, and if necessary, corporal punishment would be used. Turibio Santos met Villa Lobos for the first time in his fourteens, today is one of the most important interprets and researchers of Villa.
    Turibio: - From the beggining Villa-Lobos assumed a responsability with Rio de Janeiro's musical life (Carioca means from Rio de Janeiro), and besides the usual thought, the first meeting of Villa's with music was not with formal musical education, but with music from streets, and in the moment he jumped his fence to play his guitar with "choroes", he also jumped the fence of culture, he started to be Villa, because he had the guts of not repeting european forms, he was estabilishing a brazilian musical languague, and consolidating a brazilian culture, he made that knowing wonderful artists, like Zé do Cavaquinho, Medeiros, Pixinguinha, da Paixão Cearense, João Pernambuco, Ernesto Nazareth.
    Herminio: - Villa with his guitar came, and everybody said: O there comes classical guitar., and Villa came with all his way of being, and played beautifully, what's important to say is that Villa Lobos never stood far from Brazilian Popular Music ( MPB ), and from the popular musician.
    Narrator: - The maestro and composer Guerra-Peixe was a contemporany of Villa, know all his work and lived very close to Villa. The relationship between Villa and Guerra never were always cordial, but Guerra recognizes Villa's value.
    Guerra-Peixe: - The carioca's (carioca means Rio de Janeiro citizens) musicians were making what were the best in Brazil, and himself was among groups of "choroes" and absorbed the best of them, it's from this time his best works.

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    If you have any spare time, and find some recording of Quartour Symbolique, could you send to me? I've been looking for it during years. My e-mail is brcmano889@hotmail.com

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