Friday, 16 October, 9.30, p.m.
Church of São Martinho
CanteChão:
João Moreira (tenor), Manuel Rebelo (barítono), Sérgio Silva (bass), João Vaz (organ)
The voice is a means of musical expression found in all civilizations and all periods of history. The emotional and intuitive character of the voice, as well as its obvious inherency to communication between human beings, make vocal expression a natural medium for the expression of many realities. This naturalness explains the fact that the voice is one of the most common vehicles for folk music. Cante alentejano, recently declared intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO, is a paradigmatic example of this situation. Perpetuated by the unmistakeable voices of rural workers, sung in unison or simply parallel harmonies and without instrumental; accompaniment, this way of singing seems to transmit the suffering experienced under the torrid sun of the Alentejo. The slow melodies serve for both religious and secular texts. This repertoire has been the object of research during the last decades, and led to an extensive survey of a vast number of chants. Similar in character, the cantu in paghjella of Corsica uses three different vocal registers of the male voice which move in parallel motion for most of the time. These chants, transmitted orally over the centuries, have a common structure, the second voice beginning, followed by the bass and finally by the upper voice. In cantu in paghjella secular and sacred texts also coexist. The adjective “Gregoriano” refers to Pope St Gregory the Great who, according to tradition, was responsible for the final versions of some of the chants of the end of the 6th century. More strictly, the term “Gregorian chant” is applied only to these melodies, being distinguished from both early or parallel versions (Ambrosian chant, Mozarabic chant, etc.) and the multiple variants which the melodies underwent over the centuries, in accordance with changes in musical taste. However, the term is normally used to refer to the vast collection of melodies that survives to this day as the official music of the Roman Catholic Church. In the present programme, these different vocal manifestations are given together with organ works from the 15th - 17th centuries, based on pre-existing melodies. The organ is also heard here as an outside element that supports the voices in various ways: creating a contrapuntal web around a cantus firmus, duplicating the lines of a piece of vocal polyphony, playing a simple drone supporting the chant, or providing an ostinato accompaniment in the arrangements of cante alentejano. As though to establish a bridge between the voice and the organ, organum, one of the first examples of polyphony in the history of Western music, superimposes an ornamented melodic line over a pre-existing melody sung in very slow note values. The difficulty (or impossibility) of singing these long notes is easily got round with the use of the organ, an instrument for which the duration of sounds has no limit. Organum was the starting point for a long tradition of vocal polyphony that stretched throughout Europe for a number of centuries. In Portugal, chiefly as a result of the Counter-Reformation, sacred vocal polyphony continued until the end of the 17th century. Though progressively more open to compositional mannerisms of the seconda prattica, Portuguese composers of the 17th century stayed faithful to a polyphonic structure clearly rooted in the tradition of the previous century, still maintaining the voice as the preferred means of expression.
João Vaz
Traditional from the Alentejo
Quinta-feira de Assunção
Anonymous (Buxheimer Orgelbuch, 15th c.)
Portugaler
Leonin (c.1150-1201)
Haec dies
António Carreira (a.1530-a.1594)
Fantasia em ré
Tento com cantus firmus
Fantasia em Lá-Ré
Anonymous (Cancioneiro de Palacio, 16th c.)
Ay, Santa María
Manuel Rodrigues Coelho (c.1555-1635)
Kirios de 1º tom (alternated with plainchant)
Tradicional (Córsega)
Beata viscera
Frei Domingos de São José (17th c.)
Obra de 5º tom
Anonymous (Cancioneiro de Palacio, séc. XVI)
¡Oh Reyes Magos benditos!
Francisco Correa de Arauxo (1584-1654)
Glosas sobre el canto llano de la Inmaculada Concepción
(Facultad Organica, 1626)
Traditional from the Alentejo
Entrai, pastores, entrai
Pedro de Araújo (séc. XVII)
Obra de passo solto de 8º tom
Filipe da Madre de Deus (c.1630-1687)
Salve Regina
Participants
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Recently formed. This group is made up of the voices of João Moreira (tenor), Manuel Rebelo (baritone) and Sérgio Silva (bass) with the participation of the organist João Vaz. CanteChão - a neologism that joins the expressions “cante alentejano” (the traditional vocal music of the Alentejo region) and “cantochão” (plainchant) - reflects the idea of this project, which links the Alentejan vocal tradition to the extremely rich legacy of Gregorian chant and Iberian polyphony of the 16th and 17th centuries. The comment thread in these two different musical realities is the power of the voice. Both the exuberant ornamentation of cante and the delicate melismas of Gregorian melodies possess that unmistakeable expressiveness that only the human voice can attain. In the same way, one senses the same cumplicity between voices both in learned polyphony and in the popular contracanto. The organ - itself an instrument that, throughout history, has travelled between the sacred and the secular – adds an instrumental component to the group. |
CanteChão|
Born in Lisbon, João Vaz holds a doctorate in music and musicology from the University of Évora, where his thesis was entitled The organ works of Brother José Marques e Silva (1782-1837) and the end of the organ tradition in Portugal during the Ancien Regime, written under the supervision of Rui Vieira Nery. He holds a diploma in organ from the Higher School of Music of Lisbon, where he studied under Antoine Sibertin-Blanc, and from the Higher Conservatory of Music of Aragon in Zaragoza, where he studied with José Luis González Uriol, on a grant from the Gulbenkian Foundation, and also has a licentiate in architecture from the Technical University of Lisbon. He has been extremely active internationally, both as performer and teacher on organ courses. He has made over ten solo recordings, especially on historical Portuguese instruments. As performer and musicologist he has concentrated particularly on Portuguese sacred music, founding in 2006 the ensemble Capella Patriarchal, which he directs. His publications include articles that concentrate above all on Portuguese keyboard music, he currently teaches organ at the Higher School of Music in Lisbon, having also taught at the Gregorian Institute of Lisbon, the University of Évora and the School of Arts of the Portuguese Catholic University. Founder of the International Organ Festival of Lisbon in 1998, he is currently artistic director of the concert series that take place using the six organs of the Basilica of the Palace of Mafra (to whose restoration he was permanent consultant) and of the historical organ of the Church of São Vicente de Fora, in Lisbon (of which he became titular organist in 1997). |
João VazNotes about the Organ
Church of São Martinho, Funchal
The oldest documental reference it has been possible to find concerning the existence of a pipe organ at the parish church of São Martinho goes back to 1806. According to a record set down by the treasurer of the Confraria de Nossa Senhora do Rosário (Fraternity of Our Lady of the Rosary), an organist was contracted in 1806 to tune the organ, and there are other later records referring to maintenance work.
In the record of expenditure for the year 1862, to be found in the Accounts Book (1834-1877), the vicar José Rodrigues de Almada noted down the sum of 200,000 réis for payment of the new organ, specifying that 150,000 réis were contributed by the Benefice of the church; 40,000 réis was credited from the amount paid for the old organ and 10,000 réis was donated, thus making up the real price of the instrument.
From this source it has proved impossible to determine the conditions for its transport, or where it was acquired. What is certain is that in 1863 the organ was already in this church, for that year Father João G. de Noronha was contracted to tune the said instrument, receiving 2,000 réis for his work.
With the transfer of the parish to the newly consecrated church in 1918, the organ was then taken there, where it continued to function until 1934. According to the records found in the Accounts Book (1877-1954), the organ underwent successive maintenance works, the most expensive being in 1879 (a payment of 38,000 réis to Nuno Rodrigues) and, especially, in 1916, because it was very out of tune and had a number of technical problems.
As an instrument to accompany and enhance divine worship, the organ of the church of São Martinho will have participated in various solemnities, and in the year 1917 there is a record in the Accounts Book of receipt of 10.700 réis “arising from the contribution of the organ to the festivities”.
Manual (GG, AA, C-f´´´)
Stop Diapason Bass (GG-b)
Stop Diapason Treble (c´-f´´´)
Principal
Flute
Dulciana