CHACONA AMAZONICA Op. 86 for Symphonic Band by MARLOS NOBRE (Brazil 1939 – 2024)
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[#312] July 14, 2025 1998 | Symphonic Band | Grade 5 | 10’ – 15’ | Chacone
Premiered by Banda Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo conducted by Abel Rocha on Jul 21, 1998 in Campos do Jordão, São Paulo, Brazil
Chacona Amazonica, by Brazilian composer, conductor and pianist Marlos Nobre de Almeida is our Composition of the Week.
Chacona Amazonica was written in 1998 by Marlos Nobre, honoring a commission by the “Banda Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo” and was premiered on July 21, 1998, at the International Festival of Campos do Jordão, São Paulo.
The work is a set of variations on a theme presented at the beginning in the style and form of a great Chacona.
The work is scored for standard symphonic band setting and has a duration of about 12 minutes.
Marlos Nobre received commissions from numerous institutions, including the Ministry of Culture in Spain, the Free University of Music of São Paulo, the Neuchâtel Chamber Orchestra in Switzerland, The Apollon Foundation in Bremen, Germany and the Maracaibo Music Festival in Venezuela. He also sat on the juries of numerous international music competitions, including the Città di Alessandria Prize, the Arthur Rubinstein Piano Master Competition, and the Paloma O'Shea Santander International Piano Competition.
Marlos Nobre studied piano and music theory at the Conservatory of Music of Pernambuco from 1948 to 1959, and composition with Hans-Joachim Koellreutter and Camargo Guarnieri. He received a scholarship from the Rockefeller Foundation, to pursue his studies at the Latin American Center in Buenos Aires, with Alberto Ginastera, and later with Olivier Messiaen, Gian Francesco Malipiero, Aaron Copland and Luigi Dallapiccola. He worked also with Alexander Goehr and Gunther Schuller at the Berkshire Music Center in Tanglewood in 1969, where he met Leonard Bernstein. The same year he studied electronic music at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center in New York.
His eclectic compositional style featured a mixture of classical compositional techniques such as polytonality, atonality and serialism combined with stylistic and conceptual influences from Brazilian traditional and popular music. His diverse approach to composition was enhanced through his studies with the above-mentioned composers.
Nobre was composer-in-residence at the Brahms-Haus in Baden-Baden invited by the Brahms Society, Germany from 1980 to 1981. He held the Guggenheim Fellowship in 1985–86.
Nobre was a visiting professor at Yale, the Universities of Indiana, Arizona and Oklahoma and the Juilliard School. He was Music Director of the Radio MEC and the National Symphony Orchestra from 1971 to 1976, the First Director of the National Institute of Music at FUNARTE from 1976 to 1979, and the President of the Brazilian Academy of Music. He was also President of the International Music Council of UNESCO.
He was Guest Composer at the University of Georgia and Texas Christian University. In 2000, he received the highest academic awards from the Texas Christian University the "Cecil and Ida Green Honors Professor" and from the Indiana University the "Thomas Hart Benton Medallion".
His “Desafio” No. 3 for violin and strings is among 16 compositions by Nobre for various combinations of instruments that draw on the concept of the "desafio". In Brazilian culture, a "desafio" is a musical duel between two singers known as “repentistas sertanejos” (lit. country singers) who playfully and competitively alternate improvised poetic lyrics while accompanying themselves on guitar. The "desafio" tradition is particularly common in the Brazilian northeast and typically takes place at a public square or local market. Desafio No. 3 is a dialogue between the violin soloist and string orchestra, ant the piece reflects the modal, lyrical, and conversational nature of the music of the Brazilian “repentistas”.
Marlos Nobre was active as a pianist and conductor, having performed and conducted with several orchestras: Suisse Romande Orchestra, Geneve; Collegium Academicum, Switzerland; Buenos Aires Philharmonic Orchestra at Teatro Colón; SODRE Orchestra of Montevideo, Uruguay; the National Orchestras of Portugal, Spain, Mexico, Venezuela, Peru (National Symphony Orchestra of Peru), Guatemala and all Brazilian Orchestra; the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, London; Philharmonic of Nice, France.
Later on, he was the Director of Contemporary Music Programs at Radio MEC-FM of Brazil; the President of "Jeunesses Musicales" of Brazil and the President of the Musica Nova Editions of Brazil.
Nobre died in Rio de Janeiro on December 2, 2024, at the age of 85.
Other works for winds:
• Ukrinmakrinkrin, for voice, winds and piano (1964)
