Claudio Santoro

Among Brazil's major composers of the 20th century, Claudio Santoro attained an international reputation. In addition to composing, he was an important force in Brazilian musical life as a conductor, educator, and organization executive. Santoro was born November 23, 1919, in Manaus, Brazil, in the state of Amazonas. He took violin and piano lessons as a child, and he showed such promise that the state government financed his move to Rio de Janeiro and his studies at the Conservatório Brasileiro de Música there. In addition to violin, he also took composition lessons from Hans-Joachim Koellreutter. By 18, Santoro was already teaching violin at the conservatory. He also traveled to Paris for composition studies with the influential pedagogue Nadia Boulanger, and in 1948, he won the Lili Boulanger Memorial Fund Prize at the University of Massachusetts at Boston; the judging panel included Stravinsky and Copland. Back in Brazil, Santoro co-founded the Brazilian Symphony Orchestra and performed with the group. He went on to establish numerous performing organizations and musical institutions in Brazil, many of which still exist today. He founded the Chamber Orchestra of Radio MEC, the Chamber Orchestra of the University of Brasilia, and the Symphony Orchestra of the National Theater of Brasilia, among other groups. Santoro served as the musical director of the Cultural Foundation of the Federal District, as organizer and director of the Center for Diffusion and Information for the Music of Latin America, and as president of the Academy of Music and Letters of Brazil. Primary among Santoro's compositions were his 14 symphonies, which spanned the years from 1940 until the end of his life and displayed various styles. He also wrote three concertos, seven string quartets, keyboard music, and vocal music. Santoro traveled to West Germany in the 1960s and 1970s, serving as Resident Artist for the city of West Berlin in 1966 and 1967, and teaching composition and conducting at the Staatliche Hochschule für Music Heidelberg-Mannheim from 1970 to 1978. Santoro made guest conducting appearances with the Warsaw Philharmonic, the Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) Philharmonic, and the Moscow State Orchestra, as well as with numerous Brazilian groups. Some 50 of his works have been recorded, and in the early 2020s, the Naxos label embarked on a complete cycle of his symphonies. Santoro died in Brasilia on March 27, 1989, during an orchestral rehearsal.
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