Resenha musical
- Places of Publication: São Paulo, Brazil & Araraquara, Brazil
- Language: Portuguese
- Date of Publication: 1938-1945
- Editors: Clóvis de Oliveira & Ondina Bonora de Oliveira
- Type: Citation Only
- Prepared by: Mariana Calado
Resenha Musical was published monthly (mainly in double issues) from September 1938 to May/June 1945. At first, the journal was published in Araraquara, a city in the state of São Paulo were Clóvis de Oliveira and Ondina Bonora de Oliveira (director and editor) lived and worked as music teachers. However, by the issue number 17/18, January/February 1940, the journal was being printed at the typography Oficinas Gráficas do Legionário in São Paulo. Soon after, the local of publication changed definitively to São Paulo as the Oliveira couple also moved there.
The page number per issue ranged from six pages to 46 pages – a peak achieved in 1941. Saving the variation of page number, the graphism of the journal didn’t register many alterations. It had two columns per page and was illustrated with pictures of Brazilian musicians featured in the journal. Several of the pictures were signed and dedicated to Clóvis de Oliveira. The very first issues were distinguished by the colourful first page with a cover with the picture of composers and musicians introduced with issue number 5/6. From the thirty-seventh issue the cover changed and was designed by the artist Franco Cenni, later replaced with a drawing by Hob (issue number 57/58).
Clóvis de Oliveira (1910-1975) was a musicologist and teacher of piano and the history of music. He founded Resenha Musical in collaboration with Ondina Bonora de Oliveira, a piano teacher. Both wrote to the journal, but Ondina’s collaboration is less visible. Other collaborators included the musicologists Luiz Heitor Corrêa de Azevedo and Eurico Nogueira França (who wrote from Rio de Janeiro); Genésio Pereira Filho, responsible for the section “Microfone” (radio news) and for the translation of articles in Spanish; Artur Melo Godói, music critic alongside Clóvis de Oliveira; Emirto Lima, Colombian professor and composer; and Alberto Giordano, Argentinian musicologist.
Resenha Musical was particularly interested in local musical life and in the promotion of Brazilian music. When edited in Araraquara, it followed the cultural life of the city, regarding concerts and art exhibitions, and especially the activities of the Conservatório Dramático e Musical. In São Paulo, Resenha Musical continued to follow the activities of Brazilian musicians and composers centred in the seasons of municipal institutions (Departamento Municipal de Cultura) and of music associations, also publishing about the musical life of other regions and abroad. The journal grew in influence reaching most of the Brazilian states and other countries of South and North America, particularly on account of Clóvis de Oliveira’s contacts and efforts in its dissemination. As a result, the journal maintained a steady content and received the support of different businesses and services that announced in its pages. However, this wouldn’t be enough to overcome the high price of paper and economic impact of the Second World War in Brazil.
As part of the campaign in favour of the Brazilian music, Resenha Musical published articles about Brazilian composers, the development of a music history after the Portuguese dominion, and genres of traditional and popular music and all the influences blended in its definition. The journal also published a supplement: short works of choral and chamber music, most of them by Brazilian composers like Fructuoso Lima Vianna, Arthur Pereira (featured five times), Guilherme Leanza, Cláudio Santoro, Enio de Freitas e Castro, Hans-Joachim Koellreutter (born in Germany, but living in Brazil), and the piano transcription of the National hymn, by Francisco Manoel da Silva. The quality of the supplements reveals the lack of professional editions of scores, maybe due to cost; most are simply copies of the manuscript of the composer.
The integration of Resenha Musical in the Pan-American movement is noticeable in coverages of the music life of Lima, Mexico City, and Buenos Aires, and in the participation in initiatives of cultural exchange between Brazil and the United States and other South American countries. Clóvis de Oliveira maintained collaboration with the music journals Ateneo Mexicano and Boletim Latino Americano de Música and was co-founder of Eco Musical (Buenos Aires). Some articles published in Resenha Musical were simultaneously written to other magazines, like Revista Musical Peruana (Lima) and El Tamboril (Buenos Aires), thus revealing the variety of connections that Clóvis de Oliveira created and his efforts to keep a cultural proximity across the Americas.
This RIPM Index was produced from a copy of the journal held by the Library of Congress and the Universidade de Brasília.