Please could anyone suggest a good starting point to explore this repertoire. I'm aware that there is a rich heritage from Spanish/Portuguese composers who crossed the Atlantic to work in mission stations, but I know very little about it. I would like to bring a little exotic flair to grey chilly Scotland. Thank you
Do you know Dr. or Mrs. Nathan Knutson? They have a keen interest in the work of Zipoli (not Spanish, I know), but I'm sure in reading up on him, they've found their way to material of this kind.
Chanticleer, based in San Francisco, tends to focus a little farther north, but their discography would be worth consulting. The late T. Frank Kennedy, S.J., was one of the foremost experts in Jesuit music history, so I'm sure his work has dealt with Paraguayan composers at least once. The instrumental ensemble Chatham Baroque, based in Pittsburgh, has done a fair bit of repertoire from Nueva España (often in Bolivia), and has the added advantage of being made up of very nice people. There are active early music ensembles in Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, and probably elsewhere, and a quick internet search will think of them faster than I can.
Also, if you're looking to extend your window a little later into the Classical, CPDL has several large works from Brazilian composers of the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Here are South American composers from the Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical eras that have works at CPDL. The Baroque composers are marked with an asterisk (*). Sacred works are as diverse as motets and villancicos.
Bolivia: *Juan de Araujo *Antonio Durán de la Motta
Brazil: Marcos Coelho Neto Emerico Lobo de Mesquita João de Deus Castro Lobo José Maurício Nunes Garcia Manoel Dias de Oliveira *Luis Alvarez Pinto Francisco Manuel da Silva Joaquim de Paula Souza
Colombia: Gutierrez Fernandez Hidalgo
Guatemala: Rafael Antonio Castellanos Pedro Nolasco Estrada Aristondo *Francisco de Quirós *Manuel José de Quirós
Peru: *Tomás de Torrejón y Velasco
Venezuela: Pedro Nolasco Colón José Ángel Lamas José Francisco Velásquez
We are singing the De Rivera Missa a cuatro voces on Sunday. I think he may have been Mexican so possibly too far north but it's a lovely little mass and it's on CPDL.
This repertoire is a staple of the Orchestra of New Spain in Dallas (which I perform with frequently), and the group will celebrate it's 30th anniversary soon. The director is Grover Wilkins and there is a website.
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