The Brazilian Songs of Camargo Guarnieri

Abstract

The presence of vocal music in the Brazilian composer Camargo Guarnieri (1907-1993) production is really remarkable. Along seventy years of uninterrupted activities since 1923, he wrote his songs in partnership with renowned poets. The present paper discusses the opening of new composition ways based on Guarnieri musical practice of choosing lyrics written in Portuguese, AfroBrazilian and Amerindian languages. The presence of Mario de Andrade (1893-1945) throughout the Modernist Movement as the true intellectual mentor of a generation living in the feverish metropolis of São Paulo is taken into consideration. It also tries to analyse the main subjects employed by Guarnieri, his reincidences and desistances, stressing aspects relative to the prosody such as the application of musical metrics to transcribe the poetic metrics. Due consideration is given to poems, essays and other literary genders common in the 1920`s that are present in relevant Guarnieri`s vocal pieces. From this point of view this paper discusses the mosaic of ideas upon which the composer based his work and the valuation of this plurality in a environment in syntony with the new millennium.