Sunday Feature: Brazilian Modernist Godfather

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Brazilian Modernist Godfather

BBC Radio 3 - Sunday Feature, Brazilian Modernist Godfather

Katie Derham explores her connection to the Brazilian modernist movement of 1922.

Katie Derham explores her secret family connection to the Brazilian modernist movement of 1922, in which iconoclastic poets and composers reshaped national identity forever.

In 1922, the centenary year of Brazil’s independence, a group of artists in São Paulo organised a Modern Arts Week of music, poetry, and talks. At the time, the work was greeted with anger and derision. Today, one hundred years on, the Semana de Arte Moderna is recognised as a pivotal moment in the development of art, and in forever changing the identity of Brazil itself.

This is the story of those revolutionary modernist artists, including Heitor Villa-Lobos and Oswald de Andrade, who advocated “cannibalism” in order to liberate Brazil from colonial history and European ideals. 

But this is also the secret story of Radio 3 and BBC Proms presenter Katie Derham, and her close personal connection to one of the great Brazilian modernists, the poet Manuel Bandeira. He was Derham’s father’s godfather, and great-grandmother's lover, discreetly dedicating poems to both of them.

As Derham delves into her family history, and immerses herself in a bold, radical, creative period of Brazil’s history, she will gather contributions from:

- Katie’s Aunt Sasha.
- David Slavitt, an American poet, translator, and author of more than 100 books.
- Saulo Gouveia, Professor of Portuguese language and Luso-Brazilian Culture courses at Michigan State University.
- Cyro Baptista, Brazilian percussionist.
- Kenneth David Jackson, Professor of Luso-Brazilian literatures and cultures at Yale University.
- Alexandre Dias, founder of the Brazilian Piano Institute, which collects and digitises rare recordings.
- Leslie Bary, Professor in Latin American Literature and Comparative Literature at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette.

Producers: Redzi Bernard & Phoebe McIndoe
Exec Producer: Jack Howson
Mix Engineer: Mike Woolley

A Peanut & Crumb production for BBC Radio 3.

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

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