Ciclo Brasileiro
by Heitor Villa-Lobos (1936-1937)
orchestration by Richard Rijnvos (2015-2023)*
20 minutes
1. Dança do Índio Branco
2. Impressões Seresteiras
3. Plantio do Caboclo
4. Festa No Sertão
*) Please note that the order of the movements in this orchestral version is different from the piano original.
Composed in 1936, Ciclo Brasileiro is one of the most important piano works by Heitor Villa-Lobos. Its four movements were inspired by ethnographic fieldwork into folk music. Many years prior to its composition (as early as 1905), Villa-Lobos undertook a series of research trips throughout Brazil; similar to how Béla Bartók, Zoltán Kodály and Igor Stravinsky were exploring folkloric traditions in Europe. Villa-Lobos’s ethno-musicological discoveries appear in many of his piano works, perhaps most notably in the legendary 1926 composition Rudepoêma, which was allegedly once described by one critic as “Le Sacre du Printemps meets the Brazilian jungle”. Villa-Lobos employs an enormous variety of compositional techniques to incorporate these borrowed materials; these range from direct quotations to newly invented themes with an unmistakable folk character. In doing so, the composer repeatedly emphasized the importance of separating nationalism from any political implications: “Patriotism in music, and capitalizing upon it, is very dangerous. You will have propaganda instead. But nationalism – the power of the earth, the geographic and ethnographic influences that a composer cannot escape, the musical idioms and sentiment of people and environment – these origins, in my opinion, are indispensable to a vital and genuine art”.
Dutch composer Richard Rijnvos began his orchestration of Ciclo Brasileiro in the year 2015, but it was not until 2023 before it reached its completion. It is fair to say that Rijnvos’s objectives as an orchestrator is to always respect the intentions of the composer and remain as loyal as possible to the original score. However, in the case of Ciclo Brasileiro, there is a fundamental intervention: a change of the order in which the movements are being performed. In the opinion of the orchestrator, when arranged for a large symphony orchestra, the spectacular character of Festa No Sertão (the third movement in the piano original) is simply more effective as a joyful finale. Meanwhile, the boisterous Dança do Índio Branco, with its abrupt ‘prestissimo’ ending, now serves as the opening movement in the orchestral version.
Described by Villa-Lobos as his ‘musical portrait’, Dança do Índio Branco (“Dance of the White Indian”) is composed in a binary form, alternating between two sections of music (A-B-A-B). Its opening suggests a toccata, while pounding ostinato figures provide a distinctly percussive character. Out of this texture short melodic fragments are born, leading up to a joyful orchestral tutti. By way of contrast, the B-section is much lighter in character, ‘leggieramente’, set in a dance-like 6/8 time signature.
Impressões Seresteiras (‘Minstrel Impressions’) is a gentle waltz featuring a melancholic melody. Its motives are fragmented and recombined in various ways throughout the piece, especially in the more sparkling, boisterous and virtuoso intervening passages. The initial melody appears three times: first as a solo for cor anglais, sounding ever so piteous; halfway the movement, the oboe and clarinet share a Schubertian variation; finally, the third instalment exploits the lyrical combination of low piccolo and muted violins.
The tempo of Plantio do Caboclo (‘Native Planting Song’) is a soothing ‘moderato’. Soon after the opening bars, which are presented with an assertive ‘forte’ dynamic, the music quickly switches to a calm and melodic incantation underneath softly undulating arpeggios, not unlike a hypnotic hymn. This peaceful atmosphere allows itself to be disturbed ever so slightly when, during the middle section, the accompaniment is gradually interlaced with unexpected modulations, only for the tranquility of the beginning to eventually reassert itself.
The virtuoso and joyful showpiece Festa no Sertão (‘Jungle Festival’) is again a kind of toccata, this time drawing inspiration from ‘batuque’, a traditional Brazilian dance. The ritual nature is enhanced by the contagious offbeat rhythms in the main melody and their repeated appearances. Soon the music leads up to swinging hemiola patterns with lush harmonies. The slower, sultry 5/4 melody in the middle section is being accompanied by lenghts of ‘cantabile’ ribbons, after which the opening music is repeated and being brought to a frenzied conclusion.photo: A Lua (1928) by Tarsila do Amaral
Scoring
2(II=picc).picc.2.ca.2,bcl.2.dbsn- 4.3(III=picc-trp).3.1-perc(2)-cel-hrp(2)-str(12.12.10.8.8)
Orchestration written for
Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo (OSESP)
orchestration dedicated to the memory of
Heitor Villa-Lobos
première orchestration
9-10-11-12 November 2023
Sala São Paulo, São Paulo (Brazil)
Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo, Neil Thomson (conductor)
