Clara Rodriguez in London

Londoners should check out this concert at the Southbank Centre in December. Follow Clara on Twitter @VenPianista. Unfortunately my trip to London is earlier in the year.

The Brazilian Way

Great to see this BBC broadcast of Nelson Freire's performance of Momoprécoce, from a Proms concert at the Royal Albert Hall, August 15, 2012. The São Paulo Symphony Orchestra is conducted by Marin Alsop, who introduces the work.

Guitar Etudes for Piano

Julija Bal plays her piano arrangement of the 11th & 12th Etudes for Guitar. She has more audio at her website.

Museu Villa-Lobos on Facebook

The Museu Villa-Lobos is now on Facebook.

Brazilian World Music Day

It's Brazilian World Music Day! Enjoy these great tracks of music, brought to you by ABMI, the Brazilian Independent Music Association. Learn more at the website.

Choros #06 restored

In 1954 Villa-Lobos visited the recording studio in Berlin, and the result was an LP with Choros #06 on one side, and Bachianas Brasileiras #7 on the other.  The LP shows up occasionally on eBay, but I know it as a Kuarup CD re-issue from 2005. Now we have a new transfer/restoration of the Choros from Naxos Classics, which is unfortunately only available for download and streaming on the Naxos Music Library (and also unfortunately unavailable for copyright reasons in the US).

The new sound is a major improvement. Though Villa-Lobos didn't have as much time to rehearse with the German orchestra as he did in his later Paris recordings with L'Orchestre National de la Radiodiffusion Francaise, this has the same authenticity that comes with the composer at the podium. The preferred recording of Choros #06 remains the recent BIS CDs with John Neschling conducting OSESP. But this is worth a listen & a download.