Talk:Bachianas Brasileiras

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved.  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 01:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

---

Bachianas brasileiras → Bachianas Brasileiras — My search of Google Scholar in both English & Portguese clearly indicates that capitalization of both words is prevalent. Cgingold (talk) 08:00, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's policy on article titles.

• Support. Good catch. Andrewa (talk) 09:21, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
• Support, but with a Caution. Current Wikipedia guidelines state that capitalization of foreign titles should reflect the usual practice in English-language sources. However, this and all other Portuguese titles of Villa-Lobos's works, both in the main article Heitor Villa-Lobos and in the List of compositions by Heitor Villa-Lobos, were changed two or three years ago to reflect Portuguese rules of capitalization (and, in the case of titles of some other works, orthography reforms put in place since the original publications of the scores). Whether this was a correct decision at that time or not (and whether Wikipedia guidelines may have changed in the meantime or not), for the sake of consistency, a change in capitalization here ought necessarily to entail a wholesale change of work titles in those two articles, at least.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:31, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

• Very interesting -- I wasn't aware of the decision that was implemented vis-a-vis Portuguese titles. BTW, I was actually a bit surprised to find that, for the most part, even the Portuguese entries I turned up on Google Scholar used the form that I'm proposing. So even without the guideline you cited, the current title isn't supported by real-world usage. Cgingold (talk) 14:34, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Discussion

Carrying on the above discussion, in an effort not to clutter up the survey unduly: I'm not so sure there was ever a "decision" made, but starting in September 2006 these capitalization and orthography changes began to be made in the article Heitor Villa-Lobos (see the Edit History). Prior to that time, both words in "Bachianas Brasileiras" were capitalized, and this was also true of the title of the present article (so that the current proposed change is actually a proposal to revert the capitalization to the original form). The word "chôros" was deprived of its circumflex (in the Villa-Lobos article) at about the same time, and this process continued for some while, as can be seen by Talk:Heitor_Villa-Lobos#The_Uirapuru_spelling_war, from March 2008. I do not personally wish to argue for one position or another, but it does seem that if Wikipedia has a clear guideline about these matters, it should be followed. Just to demonstrate my neutrality, I will point our that Appleby has "Bachianas brasileiras" (an English-language book adhering to normal Portuguese practice), the Museu Villa-Lobos catalogue of works, despite being a Portuguese-language publication, has "Bachianas Brasileiras" (but also "Choros" rather than "Chôros"), and Vasco Mariz sidesteps the problem by always translating to English, and thus using English norms: "Brazilian Bachianas". Complicated, isn't it?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:43, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

conversion of plural to singular for titles of individual works

E.g., Bachiana Brasileira No. 1, etc., for the same reason that one does not say Beethoven's "Symphonies No. 1." Recordings of individual works use the singular form. Milkunderwood (talk) 08:25, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Some recordings of the works use the singular form, but by no means all, or even most of them. However, all of the scores use the plural (this is also true for the series of Chôros. Do recordings take precedence over the published scores in cases like this? While we are at it, shouldn't the capitalization follow Portuguese norms instead of English ones, i.e., "Bachiana(s) brasileira(s)", rather than "Bachiana(s) Brasileira(s)"?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:02, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Jerome, I apologize for not having done my homework properly before jumping in there. I don't know the "correct" answer to either of those questions. Following your lead I now see that IMSLP uses the plural form for the individual works, and the lower case "brasileiras". So would it be better to simply undo, and revert to plurals and caps, or both re-pluralize and convert to lower case? Thanks for pointing out this problem. (I did know better, at least, than to get into a title move fight, which lower-casing would have involved.)

(BTW, AlanH... ??) Milkunderwood (talk) 20:19, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

The correct answer to the first question is self-evident, I think. I at least regarded the question as a rhetorical one. The second question is more problematic, and this was already discussed here some months ago, briefly. Titles in Portuguese (as in most languages using the Roman alphabet, apart from English) use sentence case, which means only the first word and proper nouns are capitalized. The fact that "most sites on the web" or some other statistical evidence may run contrary to this is not sufficient: Repeating an error 10,000 times does not cause it to stop being an error. However, in the present case there is also the evidence of the practice of the Museu Villa-Lobos, presumably reflecting the late composer's preference. In the catalog of his works (I have the second edition in front of me, though I believe there is a third edition published on the web somewhere), there is a section of notes on a number of his compositions, either directly from his pen or relying heavily upon his writings. The capitalization of titles there follows the English practice in general, and in particular for the Bachianas. For example, the note on No 1 (p. 188) begins: "Os primeiros compassos de Bachianas Brasileiras número 1 criam, simultaneamente, o ambiente típico brasileiro e a atmosfera harmônica clássica." In this same place, movement titles consisting of more than one word follow English practice by capitalizing the first word and all subsequent words except articles, conjuctions, and prepositions, e.g., "Canto de Nossa Terra", "O Trenzinho do Caipira". The published scores are of no use in this respect, by the way, since nearly all of them give titles in full caps—the exceptions being the Ricordi score of No. 2, which is all lowercase (as a typographical design) on the cover and half-title page, but full caps at the head of the score itself, and the Associate Music Publishers score of No. 5, which has full caps on the cover and half-title page, but uses English-style capitalization at the head of the score: Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 / for Soprano and Orchestra of Violoncelli. The question of capitalization then really comes down to whether Wikipedia is to follow the rules of the language in question (Portuguese, in the present instance), or the preferred style used by the composer or by his estate. The plural form of the titles, however, seems not to be in doubt. Perhaps this is because every one of the nine Bachianas is a multi-movement composition.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:06, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Oh, yes, with reference to your parenthetical question. You may not have noticed, but I have done some work on that, though only as far as the stage works. Chamber music, vocal, and solo instrumental compositions have yet to be proof-read against the New Grove.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:09, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Correction to the Introduction

I'm rephrasing the introduction as it is nonsensical in musical terminology. Procedural music has a very specific meaning, which does not relate to the music of Latin-American heritage Villa-Lobos was orchestrating, and his intention was to seek some form of classical foundation in the vernacular music of his surroundings. That this was perhaps not the most useful of exercises, in that the music of Bach is rarely syncopated, whereas so much of the music of Latin America is, does not detract from the worth of his work, and that too is a point which needs to be added, although I very happily will bow before a greater expert than I in the matter of Latin American regional folk traditions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.123.173.109 (talk) 11:02, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

Further thought has led me to ask Doctor Alfredo Rolando Ortiz in, to review the meme from the inside of Latin American music out, as he's the world's leading Latin American harper of the current day. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.123.173.109 (talk) 11:20, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

While I sympathize with your effort to make the lede clearer, the two cited sources by Gerard Béhague say precisely what the original phrasing had, and not quite the same thing as your revision. I'm not sure what Dr. Ortiz's opinion is of the late Prof. Béhague's work, but in general he is regarded as one of the most authoritative voices in the subject of Latin American music in general, and on Villa-Lobos in particular.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 23:40, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

Further thought: Rereading the lead, I see no reference at all to "procedural music" (by which I suppose you mean "process music"). Instead, I see "a number of Baroque harmonic and contrapuntal procedures" mentioned, with blue links to "harmony" and "counterpoint". I imagine that Béhague had in mind such contrapuntal techniques as canon and fugue, and harmonic devices such as the sequences found (especially) in Bachianas Brasileiras No. 4. Of course these have little or nothing to do with Latin American regional folk traditions, but they have a great deal to do with the music of Bach. The context of Béhague's remark (which perhaps should be expanded on in the body of the article) is the repudiation of the idea that these nine compositions are truly neoclassical, as is often stated by other writers who (in Béhague's view) are not probing very deeply beneath the surface appearances.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:21, 28 May 2018 (UTC)

"Teddy boys"?

The phrase "Teddy boy" here appears to be nonsensical:

> Despite the five translations—French, English, Italian, Spanish, and German—printed in the score, the composer's own notes on this movement make it clear that the meaning of capadocio is not "campagnard", "countryman", "campagnolo", etc., but rather "Teddy boy" or "layabout".

The cited source is the book by Michael Round cited elsewhere in the article, and I don't have a copy, so I can't check if Round actually uses the phrase "Teddy boy". But the linked Wikipedia article refers to a British subculture that started in the "early 50s," and the name apparently comes from "Edwardian," so it's certainly not the correct link. There's a Teddy boy disambiguation page, but none of the entries there seem relevant either.

I've never heard "Teddy boy" as generic slang meaning anything like "layabout," either. BatmanAoD (talk) 20:55, 26 August 2023 (UTC)