In September, visit the MIC.PT In Focus section dedicated to Pedro Lima, a young composer who turned 30 in the first half of 2024 and is one of Portugal’s most active voices in contemporary music.
Pedro Lima studied with Paulo Bastos at the Gulbenkian Conservatory in Braga, continuing his Music Writing studies in Lisbon with João Madureira, António Pinho Vargas and Carlos Caires. He developed a closer work relationship with the composer Luís Tinoco, having continued a master’s in Composition. In 2017, he went to London to study at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where he completed the master’s in Opera Making & Writing, oriented by Julian Philips and Julian Anderson. Winner of the SPA / Antena 2 Prize in 2016 for the work (...) e tu, de mim voaste (2016) and Young Composer in Residence at the Casa da Música in Porto in 2019, two Pedro Lima’s works have received recommendations within the Under 30 category at the International Rostrum of Composers – Talkin(g) (A)bout my Generation (2019) in Serbia in 2021 and Como Se Fosse Um Filho (2023 · commission: Miso Music Portugal) in Lithuania in 2024. Pedro Lima explores eclectic sonorities in his music, having grown up with electronic music, hip-hop and progressive rock. The composer works with timbres, harmonies and structures, and the singular ideas of his scores take upon forms and expressions varying according to the context where they exist.

The premiere of ÔBOÂ – contos de infância (2023) ‘for three-imaginary-voice oboe’, by Cândido Lima (a composer published by the MIC.PT), will occur on September 23 at the Lisboa Incomum, in the context of the OBOÉ+ project promoting the writing of new works for oboe with or without electronics. Based on composer-performer residencies, the project encompasses commissions of new pieces to António Chagas Rosa, Cândido Lima, Jaime Reis, Mariana Vieira (composers published by the MIC.PT), and Rúben Borges, to be performed by Tiago Coimbra at diverse venues in Portugal. Simultaneously, within this DME Project initiative, Composition students from the Lisbon School of Music (Cristóvão Almeida, Fábio Chicotio, Marta Domingues and Tiago Jesus) have received invitations to create works in collaboration with Tiago Coimbra’s Oboe class students at the Applied Arts School in Castelo Branco (Carolina Esteves, Dulce Gonçalves, Filipe Sauvarin, Janete Pereira and Nelson Pereira). Regarding the work ÔBOÂ – contos de infância, Cândido Lima writes in the programme notes: ‘“Ôboâ” (ôbuá!), is the pronunciation of “hautbois”, oboe in French. Its sonority is close to the Portuguese word “avó / avô”, the piece’s central character, with the stories, told to one of the grandchildren, the composer, during childhood, between the ages of 7 and 10...’

On July 24, Eduardo Luís Patriarca (a composer published by the MIC.PT) was honoured with the Medal of Cultural Merit of the Vila do Conde City Council. The ceremony occurred at the Theatre of this municipality located in the district of Porto, where the composer was born. The award recognises personalities and institutions whose relevance translates into a priceless contribution to the city. In this context, Eduardo Luís Patriarca has been a teacher at the S. Pio X Academy of Music in Vila do Conde since 1991. As a posthumous tribute, the Vila do Conde City Council gave the other Medal of Cultural Merit to Eugénio Almeida Lisboa, once a critic and essayist. Besides the cultural merit, the council also honours sports and municipal merit. In 2020, Eduardo Luís Patriarca explained to the MIC.PT that, despite not having direct music roots, ‘all the moments of sheer music education were of great importance’. But he added that not all these moments had been in the classroom. ‘There are diverse conversations “over coffee” that have been more noteworthy than the entire lessons, and they’ve often involved the same people. Others have been the auditions of determined works and the impact they’ve caused’, the composer said. ‘I have never considered the academic structures as a fundamental factor for my music education’.

In September, Hugo Vasco Reis (a composer published by the MIC.PT) will have his works performed and edited in Portugal, France and the Netherlands. In this sense, the composer will release his eighth monographic album Dimensions, with a 4-piece cycle for acoustic instruments and electronics based on imaginary axes, with space referential and sound characterisation defining patterns formed by dots, lines and planes, exhausted throughout the musical discourse. This project includes the participation of Victor Pereira (clarinet), Henrique Portovedo (saxophone), António Carrilho (bass recorder), Katharina Gross (cello), and António Pinheiro da Silva (sound engineering). Additionally, on the 21st, Katharine Gross will perform Dimensions IV (2022) for cello and electronics in Strasbourg, Hugo Vasco Reis’s work making part of the cellist’s new CD album, cellomondo #3 – a world in transformation.

The piece by Igor C. Silva (a composer published by the MIC.PT), Vou (2023), for voice and electronics, will have its performance by the soprano Andrea Conangla on September 24 in the context of the Südseite Nachts at the Theaterhaus Stuttgart in Germany. At this concert entitled Zwischen neuer Musik und Pop, integrated into the In_Szene: Vokal programme and realised in cooperation with Musik der Jahrhunderte, Andrea Conangla will also perform a piece by Sara Glojnarić, the Neue Kammer will present works by Gilles Schuehmacher and Sarvenaz Safari, the Vis-à-vis trio will perform the improvised piece Hommage à Björk and the singer Viktoriia Vitrenko a work by Maxim Shalygin. In the 2015 MIC.PT Interview, Igor C. Silva said: ‘I’m interested in various, apparently distant music genres, such as glitch, IDM, indie or progressive rock. They have in common the use of electronics and a certain experimentalism and inventiveness.’

In September, Fátima Fonte (a composer published by the MIC.PT) will have two works premiered. On September 20, the Maat Saxophone Quartet, a Portuguese group based in Amsterdam, will premiere Fátima Fonte’s work Aurora, at the 4th Encontros Sonoros Atlânticos. The concert will occur in Monte Brasil (Angra do Heroísmo) on the Azorean Island of Terceira. The Encounters, occurring between the 14th and 24th in Lisbon and the Azores, celebrate the diversity of Portuguese music. ‘We combine contemporary music with popular singers and multimedia proposals. I want this festival to showcase particular visions of artists within their different styles’, says the composer and programmer Vasco Mendonça (Lusa). Then, on the 21st, Fátima Fonte’s piece Campanário for two carillons will have its premiere at the concert entitled Works from Porto from the 1920s, organised in the context of the Culture in Expansion programme. In this sense, works by three Portuguese composers (published by the MIC.PT), Fátima Fonte, Rui Penha and Fernando C. Lapa, will be performed on the Clérigos Tower carillon ‘dialoguing with the largest mobile carillon in the world, the Lvsitanvs’. These new compositions ‘challenge the historical ideas of the repertoire for this instrument’ and their performers will be Abel Chaves and Ana Elias.

The videodance Causa Sui, which is part of the series of collaborations that, since 2021, João Castro Pinto (a composer published by MIC.PT) has been creating with the choreographer and former North American dancer Mimi Garrard, will have its presentation in the context of the GLOBAL event occurring at the Rubin Museum of Art on September 21 in New York (USA). Organised by the Mimi Garrard Dance Theatre Company, this event features the presentation of three more videodances created in collaboration between the composers Alice Shields, Tom Hamilton and José Halac and the dancers Tim Bendernagel, Cynthia Koppe, Michael F. McBride and Samuel Roberts. Additionally, João Castro Pinto’s most recent acousmatic work, Circumsphere: To Bounce & Rebounce, is part of the finalist works selection of the 13th Biennial Acousmatic Music Composition Competition Métamorphoses 2024. The work will have its presentation at the L’Espace du Son Festival (October 16-20, Brussels, Belgium), together with other finalist pieces. ‘My music has structural affinities with soundscape composition, experimental music, and noise. But my approach is heterodox tending towards different references and genres: electroacoustic / acousmatic, electronic, and minimal’ – said João Castro Pinto in the 2018 MIC.PT interview.

João Pedro Oliveira (a composer published by the MIC.PT) received the First Prize in the C category at the 13th Biennial Acousmatic Music Composition Competition Métamorphoses 2024 for his piece N’vi’ah (2019). At this edition, the jury members of the Competition organised by the Belgian association Musiques & Recherches dedicated to electroacoustic music, are the composers Elizabeth Anderson (USA / Belgium), Julien Guillamat (France / Belgium), Jonty Harrison (United Kingdom) and Annette Vande Gorne (Belgium). Apart from this, on September 14 at the Camacho Costa Theatre in Odemira, João Pedro Oliveira will have his piece Time Spell (2004) for clarinet and electronics presented as part of the September Cultural Immersion project. This concert entitled Music Through Time, performed by Nuno Pinto (clarinet) and Miguel Azguime (electronics), will include pieces for solo clarinet with and without electronics by composers from various music history periods, intertwining compositions initially written for this instrumental set with readaptations, such as the Adagio from Johann Sebastian Bach’s G Major Sonata BWV 1001 or Marin Marias’s Préludes en harpègement no. 1 and 2. Finally, on September 27, 28 and 29, respectively, in Amarante, Manteigas e Conímbriga, the Contemporary String Quintet (Ritornello – Cultural Association) will give the first performances of João Pedro Oliveira’s work Entwine.

A recital of the opera A Laugh to Cry (2013) – with music and libretto by Miguel Azguime (a composer published by the MIC.PT) and with video and staging by Paula Azguime – will occur on on September 20 at the Gil Vicente Academic Theatre in Coimbra. A Laugh to Cry is a metaphysical theatre that reflects on the devastation of the Earth and the barbarity of the war, the destruction of Nature and the loss of civilisational memory, the hegemonic power of the ‘market’, and the consequent destruction of the cultures. This work confronts us with the possible collapse of humanity and its eventual rebirth. The opera’s performers will be Pedro Neves (conductor), Camila Mandillo & Andrea Conangla (sopranos), André Henriques (bass-baritone), Miguel Azguime & Jade Mandillo (speakers), and the Sond’Ar-te Electric Ensemble. Additionally, Miguel Azguime’s work Drifting 3 (2023) is part of the Music Through Time recitals with the clarinettist Nuno Pinto on September 14 and 15, respectively, at the Camacho Costa Theatre in Odemira and at the Arts Station, in the context of Culture Agents and Artists Meeting in the Council of Odemira. Finally, on September 23, Miguel Azguime will participate in the Round Table with José Pina, Rui Horta, and Ana Umbelino and moderated by Catarina Neves, in the context of the next RTCP meeting (DGArtes) – Network Dialogues – from creation to programming / from programming to creation, at the José Lúcio da Silva Theatre in Leiria.

Paulo Bastos’s work Branca Rosa Brava (2023) for voice, alto saxophone, accordion and string quartet is part of the Journey to Portugal concert by the Síntese – Contemporary Music Group conducted by Yan Mikirtumov on September 1 at the Santo Estêvão Church in Póvoa de Atalaia. In 2024, the Síntese has given concerts in places connected with Eugénio de Andrade in Porto, Lisbon, and Serpa to end in the poet’s hometown. In this context, the Síntese will also perform music by Carlos Guedes and Sofia Sousa Rocha (a composer published by the MIC.PT). Then, on September 10, Paulo Bastos will have his work Cinco quadros para Alice (2009) performed by the La Folie Duo at the CiMa International Music Festival in Manizales (Colombia). At this concert, integrated into the Ibermúsicas project, the duo constituted by Daniela Anjo (flute) and Sónia Amaral (piano) will also present the music by Luiz Costa, Vianna da Motta, Joly Braga Santos, Donizetti and Benjamin Godard. Finally, on the 14th, the percussionist Jonathan Silva will give a concert integrated into the Um Vibrafone na Ria project on board a boat operated by Terra d’água (boarding on Cais do Bico, Murtosa), whose programme will include Paulo Bastos’s Íris-abandono... (2016) and works by Nebojša Jovan Živković, Bernardo Lima, Jónatas Pereira, Daniel Bernardes and Paulo Perfeito.

In September, Sara Carvalho will have her work Komorebi (2024), for string quintet, premiered by the Contemporary String Quintet (an ensemble of the Cultural Association Ritornello). This Quintet consists of the violinists António Ramos and Clara Ramos, the violists Diana Antunes and Clara Dias, and the cellist Rogério Peixinho. The work will have its presentations in various regions of Portugal between September and November, with three performances planned for this month. The premiere will occur on September 27 at the Amarante Cultural Centre. On the next day, Komorebi will have its performance at the Municipal Auditorium in Manteigas. Finally, on September 29, the work will travel to Conímbriga, where the Contemporary String Quintet will give a concert at the Monographic Museum. During this tour, the Quintet will also present world premieres of works by other Portuguese composers. In this sense, the programme includes Encircled by Kandinsky (2024) by Ana Magalhães, Entwine (2024) by João Pedro Oliveira, and Corais do Monte (2024) by Amílcar Vasques-Dias. Like Sara Carvalho, the latter two composers are also published by the MIC.PT. This concert series allows the public to discover new contemporary music creations, celebrating diversity and innovation within the current musical landscape.

An initiative by the Scientific Council of the Portuguese Music Research & Information Centre (MIC.PT), curated by the composer Isabel Soveral, and hosted within the CPIA Permanent Seminar (Creation, Performance and Artistic Research Group) at the INET-md, the 3rd Meeting on Music, Technology and Research will occur on September 27 at the DeCA of the University of Aveiro (CCCI Auditorium). Registration is free. Researchers interested in making a presentation at the 3rd Meeting on Music, Technology and Research should send the completed form to research@mic.pt until September 15, 2024. This event aims to globally contribute to the progress and development of such disciplines as music creation, performance, theory and technology, prioritising subjects connected with contemporary creation and music technology – analysis and theoretical reflection on the creation and performance with electronics. It is a forum for discussion, encouraging music research on various aspects of aesthetic and technical thought in the context of music creation, performance and technology.
In this sense, a call is open for works in the following areas: 1) music creation and studio technical formation; 2) music notation of electroacoustic works; 3) music writing and studio creation; 4) development of new technological tools; 5) development of new theoretical tools in the field of electroacoustic music analysis; 6) interaction between acoustic and electronic instruments; 7) spatial configuration as a relevant parameter in the structure of the electronic music narrative. This initiative aims to develop students’ literacy from different education cycles in music creation, focusing on music creation with electronics.

João Carlos Pinto’s New Composer Page has been available on the MIC.PT since August. He began his musical training in Braga. Then he studied first in Lisbon (ESML) and later in Hamburg with Alexander Schubert as a tutor (Hochschule für Musik und Theater). João Carlos Pinto is a composer gaining more and more (inter)national recognition who has already presented his works in various places: South Korea, USA, Colombia, Mexico, Argentina, Germany, France, Holland, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Belgium, Norway, Iceland, Denmark, Spain and regularly in Portugal. He has also received commissions from several prestigious organisations, such as UNESCO, Braga Media Arts, ZKM Karlsruhe, Gaudeamus, Schallfeld Ensemble, ensemble neoN, RTP, Antena 2, Casa da Música, Centro Cultural de Belém, Orquestra Gulbenkian, and Arte no Tempo, among others. In addition to his work as a composer, João Carlos Pinto is also active as a performer, focusing on experimental theatre and electronics. He is also a constructor of new musical instruments.

In July and August the Espaço Crítica para a Nova Música published two new Pedro Boléo’s texts (in Portuguese) – Um espanto sempre necessário: novas obras para voz e orquestra and Sementes que germinam para além das escolas. In the first one, the author leans over the Composing for Voices and Orchestra workshop’s final concert (Empowering Opera [enoa]) on June 28 at the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon. Its programme included music by Cong Wei, Fran Barajas, Hibiki Mukai, João Carlos Pinto, Luca Francesconi, Mariana Vieira and Stylianos Dimou performed by Camila Mandillo (soprano), Marco Alves dos Santos (tenor), André Henriques (baritone), Gulbenkian Orchestra and Luca Francesconi (conductor). In the second review, Pedro Boléo writes about the O Canto das Sementes II concert (DME Project), which occurred on July 25 at the Lisboa Incomum and where the Barcelona Modern ensemble presented works by Tiago Jesus, David Teixeira da Silva, Daniel D’Adamo, Mafalda Silva, João Coimbra Hèctor Parra and Jaime Reis.

Since the end of May, two new In the 1st Person Interviews (in Portuguese) with the composers Cândido Lima and António Pinho Vargas, conducted by Pedro Boléo and recorded in november 2023 at the O’culto da Ajuda in Lisbon, are available on the MIC.PT YouTube Channel.
Presently the MIC.PT YouTube Channel contains 33 New Interviews to composers residing in Portugal, realised since 2019; as well as eight Interviews from the MIC.PT Archive, realised between 2003 and 2005.
The New Interviews, conducted by Pedro Boléo, were filmed at the O'culto da Ajuda in Lisbon and realised in the context of the In the 1st Person cycle of the Music Today and Research & Invention Music radio broadcasts, produced by the MIC.PT and Miso Music Portugal for the Antena 2. They constitute a (re)visit to the creative universe of various composers published by the MIC.PT, following the Historical Interviews recorded by the MIC.PT almost 15 years ago. Today they are unique registers of the artistic evolution of each interviewed composer.
In order to access the Interviews (in Portuguese) follow the links below or visit the MIC.PT YouTube Channel.