Photo via University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee
Mariana Salles and Lúcia Barrenechea
Mariana Salles and Lúcia Barrenechea
Milwaukee and UWM are fortunate to have Lúcia Barrenechea and Mariana Salles on one of the three stops on their Fall tour of the United States. They are both faculty members at the University Federal of Rio di Janeiro (UNIRIO) which is sponsoring their tour. They will present works by Latin American composers.
Barrenechea and her husband Sergio were featured performers at the Musiques et Vignes en Confluence, a chamber music festival for wine lovers in the Loire Valley this past summer in France organized and hosted by Bernard Zinck, associate professor of violin at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Together they have a long history discovering and presenting Brazilian music to the public, working “closely with Brazilian composers who write specifically for our duo. We take Brazilian music everywhere we go with great joy and honor.”
Salles is known a member of the contemporary music ABSTRAI Ensemble, as well as researching and disseminating the Brazilian repertoire for violin and piano in a duo with pianist Lúcia Barrenechea. “This will be my first time in the US,” Salles said, “so I am really looking forward to performing there. During the pandemic, I taught an online masterclass to Dr. Zinck’s violin class, so, in a way, I have already met some of the UWM students.”
On Thursday, Sept. 28 they will offer a program of Latin American music by composers some of whom are well known to American audiences such as the Mexican composer Carlos Chavez and Heitor Villa-Lobos.
Barrenechea explained that there was a good reason for this. “Chavez and Villa-Lobos are two of the most important Latin American composers of the 20th century, not only because of their amazing musical output, but also because of their work as advocates of musical education based in the culture of their respective countries. They essentially brought attention to the sound of indigenous music of Mexico and Brazil in a time that it was common sense in Latin America to replicate European musical language. So, we thought that it would be essential to include works of these two composers in our program for all that they stand for.”
They will play Chavez’s Sonatina for Violin and Piano and Villa-Lobos’Première Sonate-Fantaisie – Désespérance.
As there is a composition by the Brazilian composer Marcos Salles (1885-1965), O Morcego, on the program it was natural to ask Salles if he was any relation? She kindly shared the following. “Marcos Salles is my grandfather. He died before I was born, so I didn’t have a chance to meet him, only through his music. His collection of manuscripts is under my responsibility, and I have been studying and performing several of his works. He studied composition in Bologna, Italy. Several of his works follow a path, be it a story, a landscape or memories, which were left in writing. The Bat (Morcego is Portuguese for bat) is no exception to the rule: it narrates a bat’s night stroll around the forest.”
Also on the program is Carlos Guastavino’s Las Presencias n.7 - Rosita Iglesias. According to Barreneche, “Guastavino is one of the most prominent 20th-century composers in Argentina. He studied composition with Manuel de Falla and he is known as the ‘Schubert of the Pampas,’ because he wrote more than 150 songs. His musical language is tonal and neo-romantic.”
And then we moved on to Juan Fiege’s Meditación. He is a Peruvian composer and “an accomplished violinist who performed extensively not only in his country but also abroad. He is also an active music pedagogue in Lima,” Barreneche said. Icli Zitella “is a Venezuelan composer who lives in New York City. He writes music in a wide variety of styles ranging from the classical and traditional to the popular and experimental. The work we are going to present is a suite of incidental music for a play with the same title by Javier Vidal.”
Finally, on to Cuba and Joseph White, “above all, a great violinist, and in his youth attended the Paris Conservatory. La Bella Cubana is his most famous composition,” Barreneche said.
The concert is at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 28 in the UWM Fine Arts Recital Hall. The superb acoustics in this hall will enhance your listening experience for what promises to be a memorable recital. Admission is free.
For more information, visit uwm.edu/arts.
