Trupé dos Olhos d'Água
- Instrumentation
- Cello, Cello
- Publisher
- Musica Brasilis (free download; rights held by the composer and licensed to the Instituto Musica Brasilis; ISMN 979-0-69653-450-7)
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About this piece
Syrlane Albuquerque was born in Recife in 1980 and now lives in the United States. The composer's music mixes concert writing with Brazilian dances and sounds, draws on Villa-Lobos, Bartók and Ariano Suassuna's Armorial Movement, and keeps in touch with home through what the Musica Brasilis biography calls 'virtual ethnomusicology', research from videos and texts online. Trupé dos Olhos d'Água, written for the Duo Santoro, had its world premiere on the duo's tour of Rio de Janeiro state in August and September 2025. Marked Enérgico, it runs on a stamping C minor ostinato of accented sixteenths that one cello hammers out while the other sings a long espressivo tune; the players swap roles, slow down for a dolce Andante, and return to the dance for a fortissimo close.
Technical overview
C minor in 2/4 with occasional bars of 1/4, Enérgico at quarter = 92, with an Andante at quarter = 80 in the middle. Long runs of accented staccato sixteenths on repeated notes need a light, even stroke, and cello 1 jumps from the bass staff to treble-clef notes with sfz accents. The melodic passages ask for long slurred phrases with chromatic turns over the other part's ostinato, and a passage repeated four times changes dynamic on each pass (p for the first two, f for the last two).
Technical focus
- Accidentals
- Ensemble Skills
- Hairpin Dynamics
- Marcato
- Meter Changes
- Shifting
- Staccato
- Syncopation
- Tempo Changes
- Treble Clef