Claudio Santoro - Symphonies 4 and 9

Claudio SANTORO (1919-1989)

Symphony No 4 Sinfonia da Paz* (1953/4) 

Ponteio for string orchestra (1953) 

Symphony No 9 (1982)

Frevo (1953/1982)

*São Paulo Symphony Choir

São Paulo Symphony Orchestra (OSESP)

John Neschling

rec. Sala São Paulo, Brazil, February 2002. DDD

Music Web International: Recording of the Year 2006; Klassik Heute 10/10/10.

Our collaboration with São Paulo Symphony Orchestra (OSESP) has resulted in eight discs so far, including a first volume of the complete Bachianas Brasileiras by Villa-Lobos, as well as introducing lesser-known Brazilian composers such as Camargo Guarnieri, Francisco Mignone and Francisco Braga to a wider audience. The results have been electrifying, as has the critical response to both performances and works: ‘Impossible not to be converted to ‘Brasilianismo’ by this disc … Only joy itself could speak to us in such a marvellously brash manner’ (Fono Forum, about Mignone); ‘As with previous releases in this series, Neschling and his orchestra sound terrific... Terrific sonics, terrific music – Guarnieri merits very serious attention, no doubt about it. More, please.’ (Classics Today.com, about Guarnieri); ‘Under the inspired direction of John Neschling, the achievements of the São Paulo Orchestra are extraordinarily precise and colourful, aided by a recording of particular distinction’ (Répertoire, about Braga).

With the present disc, the turn has come to Claudio Santoro (1919-1989), whose orchestral output is represented by two of his symphonies as well as the shorter pieces Ponteio for strings – perhaps Santoro’s most performed orchestral work – and Frevo, both heavily indebted to Brazilian rhythms and sonorities

Review from Music Web International

The name of Claudio Santoro does not seem to be well-known outside his native Brazil. He barely gets a mention in my reference sources and I could find evidence that only one other disc of his music is available for purchase in the UK - a recording of songs on the Quartz label. I don’t usually make predictions but have a strong feeling that this situation may be about to change - thanks to this splendid offering from BIS.

Santoro studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris just after the Second World War. He was then unable to go to the USA to take up a scholarship because of his communist sympathies. He returned to Brazil and took up a position as head of the Music Faculty in Brasília in the early 1960s. Régime change a few years later led to him being exiled in Germany until 1978. He died in Brasília whilst rehearsing the orchestra of the National Theatre - this is now named after him. For more information about the composer and his works, follow the link below.

Santoro’s music was influenced to some degree by Villa-Lobos but on this evidence is more tautly constructed. It also contains strong Brazilian influences without being overtly nationalistic. There are 14 symphonies in total - information which is surprisingly lacking from the booklet - numbers 9 and 10 of which were conceived simultaneously in a successful attempt to "deceive death".

The disc opens with the fourth symphony subtitled "For peace". This is in three movements, the first is a terse Allegro which opens arrestingly. This is clearly not an extant peace but one which has to be won. The slow movement is the longest and poignant, almost elegiac in feeling apart from during a faster central section with Brazilian rhythms. The finale is a choral setting of part of the Poem of Peace by Antoineta Dias de Morias e Silva, beginning "Mankind holds in its hands the defence of peace". The context of the work is explained by Santoro’s pupil Silvio Barbato in the booklet. He sees it as "indisputably composed in the mould of Soviet socialist realism". In this context it is worth remembering that the work is an almost exact contemporary of Shostakovich’s tenth symphony.

The symphony is followed by Ponteio, an attractive miniature for strings and apparently Santoro’s most popular work. The ninth symphony which follows was written almost twenty years after its predecessor and its genesis is wonderfully described by Barbato who watched the composer at work.