3rd Period – 1970-2000

In 1975 the National Foundation for the Arts (Fundação Nacional de Arte -FUNARTE) was created, having, then as now, a decisive role in the promotion of Brazilian music, generally speaking, and also of music from the 18th and 19th centuries, in particular.

The first major FUNARTE project involving the so-called Brazilian colonial music was the collection Música Sacra Mineira, begun in the 1970s. The history of that collection is very irregular. It initially comprised 100 [1] or 200 (Neves, 1997:21) items, many of which were just movements extracted from larger works. A more coherent reordering of the works had established the number of 77, 76 of them sacred and religious works by Minas-born composers from the 18th and 19th centuries. In 1997, the amount of works reprinted was reduced to 12. There were plans, at that point, to make the 77 works available in digital versions. (Neves, 1997:26). The same 12 works were present in the publication in 2000, and more recently, as the sixth volume of the collection Música no Brasil, published in 2002, as we will see further on. In that first stage of the collection Música Sacra Mineira, the work of researchers Aluízio Viegas, Ademar Campos Filho and Geraldo Barbosa de Sousa are worthy of note. The reordering of the material was coordinated by the musicologist José Maria Neves (1943-2002).

A new phase of FUNARTE's activity in the field of old Brazilian sacred music was the partnership with researcher Cleofe Person de Mattos (1913-2002), who accomplished an important task publishing a compilation of sacred works by José Maurício, comprising of nine items:

Matinas do Natal, CPM 170 (1978) (CMSRB-079/004), Gradual Dies Sanctificatus, CPM 130 (1981) (CMSRB-054/001), Gradual de S. Sebastião, CPM 143 (1981) (CMSRB-096/001), salmos Laudate Pueri, CPM 77 (CMSRB-104/004) e Laudate Dominum, CPM 76 (CMSRB-103/001) (1981), Missa Pastoril Para Noite de Natal, CPM 108 (1982) (CMSRB-097/018), Ofício 1816, CPM 186 (1982) (CMSRB-041/004), Tota Pulchra, CPM 1 (1983) (CMSRB-165/004), Missa de Santa Cecília, CPM 113 (1984) (CMSRB-097/028).

The musicologist was also responsible for the volume Obras Corais A Cappella, again by José Maurício, published by Choir Singing Association (Associação de Canto Coral) in 1976.

In 1993 Carus Verlag, a German company, released a new edition of Missa de Requiem by José Maurício, also edited by Cleofe Person de Mattos (CMSRB-142/002). This publication presents some important developments, bringing parts for orchestra and musical scores for choir, with reductions for piano. This edition reconnects the work with its original manuscript, breaking up with the tradition of reprints made from the original 1897 edition of said work.

During the 1990s, musicologist Régis Duprat carried out important editorial work based on the manuscripts from the Francisco Curt Lange collection, held at Museu da Inconfidência of Ouro Preto, Minas Gerais. The new collection, Música do Brasil Colonial, published four works in its first volume, in 1994, and seven other works in the second volume, in 1999. Régis Duprat also coordinated the volume Música Sacra Paulista, released in 1999, comprising thirty-one works by composers from the state of São Paulo from the 18th and 19th centuries.

Complementary to that second phase, we must mention some isolated initiatives: 4 Tractus do Sábado Santo, by Lobo de Mesquita (MIG 9), published in 1979 by the musicologist Jaime Diniz (CMSRB-032/003). Also coordinated by Jaime Diniz we have, in 1980, a Regina Caeli (CPM 11), by José Maurício (CMSRB-141/005), actually a program given in a concert performed by Expressionist Choir of Maceio. The conductor and composer Ernani Aguiar published in the early 1980s Dois Motetos para Quarta-Feira de Cinzas (CPM 61 and 62) (CMSRB-082/001 and CMSRB-088/001), also by José Maurício.

Some other works by José Maurício, Popule Meus (CPM 222) (CMSRB-131/003), Sepulto Domino (CPM 223) (CMSRB-149/003), Immutemur Habitu (CPM 61) (CMSRB-082/004) and Inter Vestibulum (CPM 62) (CMSRB-088/002) were published in 1998 by Colla Voce Music, EUA, edited by conductor David Junker, from Brasília.

80 years later, we can still find echoes of the publication of Missa de Requiem, by José Maurício. A Requiem Mass was released in 1977 by Associated Music Publishers, Inc., from the USA (CMSRB-142/009). The work, edited by Dominique-René de Lerma was reduced to voices accompanied by piano. The editor states in its brief introduction that it is actually "an extension and, sometimes, a re-creation" (Lerma, 1977:s.pg.) based on the 1897 edition.

In this third period, the Brazilian State comes on board, through FUNARTE, supporting the promotion and preservation of the Brazilian repertoire from the past. The efforts by researchers and musicologists Cleofe Person de Mattos, Jaime Diniz and Régis Duprat towards editing and publishing of this repertoire deserve special note. Further publications also appear abroad, usually associated to Brazilian researchers.

[1] Information personally given by Aluízio Viegas.

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