Customer Reviews

Villa-Lobos: Chôros Nos. 8 and 9

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

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.

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!

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.