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The Golden Age of Portuguese Polyphony
Dr Owen Rees is the guest speaker on this week's Early Music Show, to be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on Sunday 27 February at 13.00. It can be heard for seven days following the broadcast via the BBC iPlayer.
Catherine Bott talks to Owen Rees about the musical legacy of King Joao
IV of Portugal and the so-called Golden Age of Portuguese polyphony. In
1578, the young king of Portugal, Sebastian led an ill-considered
crusade against the Moors of Morocco. He was routed at the battle of
Alcazar-Quivir and disappeared without trace, leaving his succession and
the fate of his nation on a knife-edge. Of the six claimants to the
Portuguese monarchy, the most powerful was Philip II of Spain, whose
invading army conquered the country in 1581. Neither Philip nor his two
successors acknowledged Portugal's cultural or ethnic independence and
treated her as nothing more than a province of Spain. Portugal's
considerable foreign revenue enriched the Spanish treasury, while her
dominance in trade & sea power was successfully challenged by the
English & the Dutch, thus loosening her grip on her colonies in
Africa, Asia and South America. This period of external domination &
subsequent economic decline lasted for nearly 60 years until the
Portuguese nobility reached the end of its tether and led a revolt
against their oppressors in 1640, as a result of which, the Duke of
Braganza was declared the new & rightful king of Portugal & the
Algarves. One of King Joao IV's first actions was to lead his countrymen
in a protracted war of restoration against the Spanish, whose armies
were finally driven out of Portuguese lands after four more years of
fierce fighting. Joao o Restaurador - John the Restorer - was not just a
successful troop-leader, though. He was also a generous supporter of
the arts, and a considerably talented musician & composer himself.
And, by the time of his death in 1656 he had amassed the biggest music
library in the world.
