HEITOR VILLA-LOBOS: Forest of the Amazon (Floresta dl Amazonas) – Anna Korondi, soprano/ Male Voices of the Sauo Paulo Sym. Orch./Sao Paulo Sym. Orch./ John Neschling – BIS multichannel SACD 1160, 78:38 [Distr. by Qualiton] *****:
Forest of the Amazon was the last large work composed by the leading South American composer, in 1958, a year before his death. MGM commissioned him to write the score for their film Green Mansions, starring Audrey Hepburn and Anthony Perkins – set in the rain forests of SE Venezuela. Villa-Lobos had never done a film score before, and he just composed a big choral/orchestral work with soprano soloist, following the screenplay’s plot, something like a full-length ballet. He thought MGM would shoot the images to match his music rather than the other way around.
Therefore he was tremendously offended when most of the music he had created was rejected and replaced with a score by Bronislaw Kaper. At least one of his melodies was retained – I’m not sure if instrumentally or vocally in the film – the gorgeous song titled Sentimental Melody in the giant cantata/symphonic poem which Villa-Lobos fashioned out of his original Green Mansions score. The work has 23 sections, a number of which have vocal/choral portions, and four of which – Sailing Ships, Twilight, Love Song & Sentimental Melody – have lyrics sung by the soprano soloist. The note booklet provides the English translations.
The work is a musical portrait of Brazil, as with so many of Villa-Lobos’ works, but more specifically of Brazil’s forests. There is a recurring theme of the Song of the Bird of the Forest, which appears in several of the sections, sung by the soprano in a mostly vocalese fashion. Villa-Lobos even originally used a Solovox along with the soprano’s vocalese for a slightly electronic effect, but I was unable to hear it. Lush lyrical settings of the vast forests alternate with more energetic sections appropriate to their titles, such as: Head Hunters, War Dance, and Forest Fire. Parts of the score still sound like something created for a romantic Hollywood film, and it is a sort of patchwork creation, but being Villa-Lobos it somehow all fits together. Some of us have enjoyed for many years the United Artists LP or CD of the piece with the composer himself conducting the Symphony of the Air and Bidu Sayao as soprano soloist, but the Sao Paulo musicians have a fine affinity for the music and with today’s hi-res surround reproduction the SACD is much more of a widescreen Technicolor audio experience.
— John Sunier
