Um Ano no Brasil

Purchase Scores and Parts

Scores and parts for this piece are available for purchase by contacting me. A version for clarinet and string orchestra is also available.

More Information

In 2013, I spent the year in Brazil as a Fulbright scholar doing research on the music education projects of that country that are inspired by Venezuela’s system of music education, commonly called “El Sistema.”  Beyond my research, I immersed myself in Brazilian music, popular and classical, and discovered so much amazing music.  I also met and befriended many great musicians, in particular a bunch of outstanding flautists, which even inspired me to begin learning the instrument myself.  Before returning to the US, I decided I would soon compose a new work as a gift to all my Brazilian friends for their kindness and the incredible experience I had in their country, and naturally I decided to write it for the flute. In 2015, I also created a version of this work for clarinet and strings.

Um Ano no Brasil (A Year in Brazil) follows my journey through the country with each movement named after a city that I lived in while working with the various El Sistema-inspired projects.  I began in Rio de Janeiro, which I think is one of the most incredible cities on earth, and where I fell in love deeply with the music of its most famous classical composer, Heitor Villa-Lobos.  I next moved on to the smaller nearby city of Campos dos Goytacazes, which in many ways is an unremarkable city, but I was taken by the warmth, friendliness, and the passion of its people.  Salvador, the “most African city outside of Africa” as I was sometimes told, was my next stop and is a fascinating city filled with energy and rhythm.  Travelling farther up the coastline, João Pessoa, in the northeast of Brazil, is where I experienced the most tranquility and stillness.  I ended my year back in Rio again, so that the final movement is a kind of completion to the first.

I started developing the musical ideas for the piece while I was still in Brazil, but composed the vast majority of the music in early 2014, completing it in late April of that year.  It is dedicated to all my Brazilian friends, in thanks for the wonderful experience I had in their country.    

Premiered July 16, 2016 by Marcelo Bomfim-flute and the Petrobras Symphony Orchestra, Sammy Fuks-conductor, at the Paróquia da Ressurreição, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.