This blog's purpose is to offer information about past and present Portuguese music, mostly -but not exclusively - classical/contemporary, its composers and performers, available written music and recordings.
Composer Joly Braga Santos was born in Lisbon, 1924. He studied violin and composition at the National Conservatory, where he was a student of Luís and Pedro de Freitas Branco. The latter was the main responsible for promoting his work around the world. During his youth, he took inspiration from Portuguese traditional music, namely folklore and Renaissance polyphony. These influences are clear in the first four symphonies he composed between his 22nd and his 27th years of age, which were almost immediately performed by the national radio broadcast Symphonic Orchestra. In 1948 he was a Higher Culture Institute scholarship holder, having then studied musicology and composition in Venice with Virgílio Mortari, Gioacchino Pasquali and Alceo Galliera. At that time he also attended the International Conduction Course with Hermann Scherchen, where he was a colleague of Luigi Nono, Bruno Maderna and Fernando Corrêa de Oliveira. Again in Portugal, Joly dedicated himself for a long period to orchestra conduction. He only started again to compose more regularly after 1960, having then written his fifth and sixth symphonies. Besides his vast musical legacy, Joly Braga Santos also had an intense activity as a music critic. He was a founding member of the Portuguese Musical Youth, lectured in Composition at Lisbon's National Conservatory, worked at the National Radio Broadcast Company's Musical Studies Cabinet, and was a conductor of the S. Carlos National Theatre Orchestra, of the Oporto Symphonic Orchestra and assistant conductor of the Portuguese radio broadcast Symphony Orchestra. He died in Lisbon in 1988.(adapted from text in PMIC)
A unique name in music history. Guilhermina Suggia (b. 27th June 1885 - d. 30th July 1950) took the world by storm when, still a youngster, was invited to play, as a soloist, in many ot the most important concert halls throughout Europe, where she thrilled everyone with her perfect technique and overwhelming, enticing style. She was one of the first women cellists to work as a soloist and had works dedicated to her by several composers. For a few years, until 1913, she lived in Paris, with companion and former teacher Pablo Casals, and they were considered the best cello players of the day. After they split up, she moved to London, where she was cherished as a performer and settled while developping her highly praised international career. Moving back to Portugal, in the late 1920s, she kept on touring and tutoring and formed a new generation of young cellists who later passed on her teachings to their own pupils. She worked with some of the greatest Portuguese musicians of her time, namely pianist and composer José Viana da Mota, conductor Pedro de Freitas Branco and violinist Bernardo Moreira de Sá. On her will, Guilhermina Suggia left her Stardivarius to the Royal Academy of Music, in London, and her Montagnana to the Conservatoire in Oporto, with the purpose of creating a fund, both in the UK and Portugal, to help young cello students. Check out Suggia's blog (mostly in Portuguese) for a lot of information and photos, as well as for a complete bibliography (including several books and articles in English).
Composer Joly Braga Santos was born in Lisbon, 1924. He studied violin and composition at the National Conservatory, where he was a student of Luís and Pedro de Freitas Branco. The latter was the main responsible for promoting his work around the world. During his youth, he took inspiration from Portuguese traditional music, namely folklore and Renaissance polyphony. These influences are clear in the first four symphonies he composed between his 22nd and his 27th years of age, which were almost immediately performed by the national radio broadcast Symphonic Orchestra. In 1948 he was a Higher Culture Institute scholarship holder, having then studied musicology and composition in Venice with Virgílio Mortari, Gioacchino Pasquali and Alceo Galliera. At that time he also attended the International Conduction Course with Hermann Scherchen, where he was a colleague of Luigi Nono, Bruno Maderna and Fernando Corrêa de Oliveira. Again in Portugal, Joly dedicated himself for a long period to orchestra conduction. He only started again to compose more regularly after 1960, having then written his fifth and sixth symphonies. Besides his vast musical legacy, Joly Braga Santos also had an intense activity as a music critic. He was a founding member of the Portuguese Musical Youth, lectured in Composition at Lisbon's National Conservatory, worked at the National Radio Broadcast Company's Musical Studies Cabinet, and was a conductor of the S. Carlos National Theatre Orchestra, of the Oporto Symphonic Orchestra and assistant conductor of the Portuguese radio broadcast Symphony Orchestra. He died in Lisbon in 1988. (adapted from text in PMIC)
