Villa-Lobos: Chôros Nos. 8 and 9

Heitor Villa-Lobos (Composer), Kenneth Schermerhorn (Artist), Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra (Conductor, Orchestra) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Orchestra: Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra
• Conductor: Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra
• Composer: Heitor Villa-Lobos
• Audio CD (October 16, 2001)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Naxos
• ASIN: B00005NUOP
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #386,288 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Villa-Lobos wrote 14 Chôros, substantial works rooted in Brazilian popular music. As you might expect, the Eighth and Ninth of the series are drenched in exotic tonal colors and alive with exciting rhythms. No. 8 features an array of conventional and unconventional percussion instruments including rattles, scrapers, and the caracaxa, which opens the piece. It's full of lively tunes as well and has an important piano part. No. 9 was composed four years later, in 1929. It opens with a riot of color, tapering down to a fascinating section for brass and winds over an obsessively repeated rhythm and a bassoon solo that's a twin to the start of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. Like its predecessor, Chôros No. 9 is an endlessly enjoyable work, and it gets a bang-up performance from Schermerhorn and the Hong Kong musicians. Their command of the idiom makes you swear you're hearing a Brazilian band. Once available on the Marco Polo label, it shouldn't be missed in this Naxos budget re-release. --Dan Davis

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An exceptionally brave performance, July 17, 2002

By 

Wildfire "quattro-media" (UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Villa-Lobos: Chôros Nos. 8 and 9 (Audio CD)

Until recently this performance was available on a Marco Polo full-priced CD. At Naxos prices it is exceptional value for money so it gets the 5 stars.
Both these Choros are among Villa-Lobos' most difficult works and it is to the credit of Schermerhorn that he keeps the orchestra under control at all, let alone so well. There are moments when it seems to teeter on the edge of fragmentation but thankfully all goes well and, in some ways, this adds to the thrill of the performance! The recording, made in the early eighties, is excellent and well balanced.
However, I would not recommend it to someone approaching Villa-Lobos for the first time. Most of his orchestral Choros are complex affairs with rhythms and melodic interplays that (while not being Avant-Garde) challenge ones musical sensibilities and this one does so to the limit. If you're brave, fine! But otherwise I would recommend the smaller Choros or, for orchestral works, the Symphonies, Amazonia, Forest of the Amazon or The Discovery of Brazil.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exotic Villa Lobos from his french years, April 6, 2002

By 

Todd Montgomery (Wilmore, KY USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Villa-Lobos: Chôros Nos. 8 and 9 (Audio CD)

Even before the Rite of Spring-ish bassoon lines in choros 9, the influence of Stravinsky and others working in France during the time Villa-Lobos was there can be heard strongly. These pieces still manage to sound quite original because of the immense percussion, and of course the choros rythyms. These are colorful, exciting, and typically brazilian in the composer's style. Although I don't know of other recordings of this to compare it to, the performance sounds magnificent. My only complaint is that the whole cd is just over forty minutes in length. I keep wanting more!

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brazilian exotica, June 4, 2007

By 

A. J. Finch (Malaysia) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Villa-Lobos: Chôros Nos. 8 and 9 (Audio CD)

The choros was - and possibly still is - a popular form for street musicians in Rio de Janeiro which inspired Villa-Lobos to write music in a characteristic Brazilian idiom. It is hard to imagine these works, with their need for a full orchestra, being played in the streets of any city but the combination of percussion and complex rhythms certainly evoke an image of the variety of ethnic origins which form the culture of Brazil. I have not heard these pieces before and so have little to compare them with. Certainly the Hong Kong P.O. enters enthusiastically into the spirit of the music - perhaps someone more well-versed with Brazilian music would be better placed to comment on the authenticity of the performance; to me it seems to convey very well the mood of tropical South America. I would recommend this CD to anyone with an interest in 20th century music, particularly that of Stravinsky, who might well have written works like this if he had spent time in Brazil.