PORTO STYLE WAY

Porto style way
for wind quintet: fl.(+picc.)/ob.(+eng.-hr.)/clar.[Bb]/bsn./horn

• composition date: 2023
• duration: ca. 17:30 min. (6’+4’30”+2’+5’)
• movements:
  I – Manoel… black-and-white beauty
  II – Sophia… sweet poetry
  III – Siza… austera elegância
  IV – Nadir… apotheosis of colour
• premiere: February 1, 2025 | Lisbon (Portugal), São Luiz Teatro Municipal / Antena 2 Festival | Art’Ventus Quintet [Ana Maria Ribeiro (fl.)/ Tiago Coimbra (ob.)/ Horácio Ferreira (cl.)/ Nuno Vaz (hr.)/ Raquel Saraiva (bs.)]

Porto style way [À moda do Porto] (2023), for woodwind quintet (Flute/Piccolo, Oboe/English horn, Clarinet, Horn, and Bassoon), is a commission from the Art’Ventus Quintet for their project “Porto inside out”. The request was for me, as a composer born and living in Porto, to write a work that could somehow give a perspective of my city “from the inside”. So, I decided to seek inspiration on the rich cultural and artistic history of the city, which has always produced artists of the highest caliber in the most diverse areas of invention. For this, I choose four iconic figures of the Porto arts from the XX-XXI centuries, namely: the filmmaker Manoel de Oliveira, the poet Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen, the architect Álvaro Siza Vieira, and the painter Nadir Afonso. To each of them I dedicate a movement that acts like a small fantasy inspired by their art, but without any purely descriptive intent. The four names also allowed me to organize my quintet in a quadripartite classical structure, of which two more substantial movements begin and end the piece, framing two inner smaller ones – a slow second and a brief intermezzo-like third.

The first movement is dedicated to Manoel de Oliveira (1908-2015), a centenarian film director whose first movies were created still in the silent era and his last oeuvre dates from 2014, already amid the digital age. The title is “Manoel… black-and-white beauty” as I imagined a condensed and abstract soundtrack for a hypothetical short film in black and white, like the first ones in Oliveira’s career.

The second movement is slow and melancholic, much as so often is the poetry of Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen (1919-2004), one of Portugal’s most distinguished authors. It is entitled “Sophia… sweet poetry” in homage to her vast poetic work, which constantly invites the reader to introspection and a certain languor to savor her delicate words.

As an intermezzo, I wrote a short but lively movement dedicated to the architect Álvaro Siza Vieira (b. 1933) with the title “Siza… austere elegance”. The most awarded Portuguese architect to date, Siza was born in the neighboring city of Matosinhos, but studied and taught architecture in Porto, becoming one of the leading figures of the internationally renowned Porto School. His architectural style is unique, characterized by seemingly simplistic and rather austere lines, which nevertheless create buildings of astonishing aesthetic beauty and are filled with natural light. It’s this inner glow that I try to capture in my music, looking for the brightness Siza creates in every nook and cranny.

Finally, “Nadir… apotheosis of color” is dedicated to the painter Nadir Afonso (1920-2013). Born in Chaves, at the northeast Portuguese mountains, he graduated in architecture from the Porto University, later collaborating with such icons as Le Corbusier (France) and Oscar Niemeyer (Brazil). But, from 1965 he decided to dedicate himself exclusively to painting. Nadir’s catalogue is vast and eclectic, ranging from dense expressionism to abstract geometry, but always using strong, vibrant colors. It’s this colorful vividness that inspired me for this last movement of my quintet.

How to depict other arts in music? I don’t think it is quite possible, but what is undeniable is that the arts do influence and interwind creating points of convergence. I don’t intend to describe any particular work of these or other artists I admire, but I do feel permanently influenced and inspired by all of them when I create my own musical works. It is at the crossroads of these huge artistic avenues that I try to find a place for my art.

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