diumenge, 18 d’abril del 2021

NUNES GARCIA, José Maurício (1767-1830) - Missa festiva em si bemol maior

"Thierry" brothers (publishers) (c.1827-c.1850) - Décoration du Ballet Historique  Donné au Théatre de la Cour, à Rio de Janeiro, le 13 de mai 1818; à l’occasion de l’acclamation du Roi D. Jean VI et du mariage du Prince Royal D. Pedro, son fils


José Maurício Nunes Garcia (1767-1830) - Missa festiva em si bemol maior (recording 1965)
Performers: Solistas, Coral e Orquestra da Universidade Rural do Rio de Janeiro;
Nelson Nilo Hack (1920-2013, conductor)

---


Brazilian composer. He was the most important composer of his time in Brazil, where he is generally referred to as José Maurício. He was the son of a modest lieutenant, Apolinário Nunes Garcia, and a black woman, Victoria Maria da Cruz. There is no evidence that he studied music at the Fazenda Santa Cruz, established by the Jesuits outside Rio de Janeiro, as has often been reported. It seems that he had some training in solfège under a local teacher, Salvador José, and he did receive formal instruction in philosophy, languages, rhetoric and theology. In 1784 he participated in the foundation of the Brotherhood of St Cecilia, one of the most important professional musical organizations of the time, and he officially entered the Brotherhood São Pedro dos Clérigos in 1791. He was ordained priest on 3 March 1792: the fact that he was a mulatto does not seem to have interfered in the process of his ordination. Many of his contemporaries praised his intellectual, artistic and priestly qualities. On 2 July 1798 Garcia was appointed mestre de capela of Rio de Janeiro Cathedral, the most significant musical position in the city. The appointment required him to act as organist, conductor, composer and music teacher; and he also had the responsibility of appointing musicians. Before that date he had begun a music course open to the public free of charge. He maintained this activity for 28 years, teaching some of the best-known musicians of the time, including Francisco Manuel da Silva. 

By the arrival of Prince (later King) Dom João VI and the Portuguese court in 1808, Garcia’s fame was well established in the colony; he had by then composed several works, including graduals, hymns, antiphons and masses. Following the tradition of the Bragança royal house, Dom João was a patron of music; and Garcia’s talents were immediately recognized. In 1808 he was appointed mestre de capela of the royal chapel, for which he wrote 39 works during 1809 alone. The prince’s appreciation was marked by the bestowal of the Order of Christ. Soon the composer became fashionable and famous for his skills in improvisation at the keyboard in noble salons. The Austrian composer Sigismund Neukomm (1778-1858), a former pupil of Haydn who lived in Rio from 1816 to 1821, referred to Garcia as ‘the first improviser in the world’. But after the arrival in 1811 of Marcos Portugal, the most famous Portuguese composer of his time, Garcia’s position and production tended to decline. His humility and benevolence kept him from counteracting Portugal’s intrigues. His activities as composer and conductor concentrated henceforth on the city’s brotherhoods, although his position at the royal chapel was nominally maintained. In about 1816 his health began to decline, considerably reducing his working capacity. Yet on 19 December 1819 he conducted the première in Brazil of Mozart’s Requiem, an event reported by Neukomm in the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung. The return of Dom João and part of the court to Portugal in 1821 had the effect of reducing the importance of the city’s musical life. Although Emperor Pedro I was himself a musician, the years following independence (1822) were not favourable for artistic development. Financial difficulties and precarious health undermined Garcia’s last nine years, and he died in extreme poverty.

Cap comentari:

Publica un comentari a l'entrada