A Night of Brazilian Music and Modernism
Performance
Friday 7 March 2025 7 - 8.15pm
The Benjamin West Lecture Theatre | Burlington Gardens
Brasil! Brasil! The Birth of Modernism
Kick off your weekend with an evening of art and live music.
Join musicians from the Black British Classical Foundation and art historian Dr. Adjoa Osei for this soirée, placing music at the heart of Brazil’s modern art movement.
In the 1920s, as Brazilian artists sought to redefine national identity and break free from aesthetic norms, music from Brazil’s indigenous and Afro-Brazilian communities became the sound of the modern. Magnificent musical juxtapositions flourished – merging European classical and operatic music with folk melodies, Afro-Brazilian rhythms, and the multi-layered cultural landscape of Brazil.
Adjoa Osei will be joined by musicians from the Black British Classical Foundation to explore this historical moment in Brazilian modernism, with live performances of the key compositions of modern brasilidade. Join us to immerse in the rhythm of samba, the folklore of indigenous and African communities in Brazil, the innovation of jazz, as well as European musical aesthetics.
Adjoa Osei is a Research Fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge. Her research explores themes that are at the intersection of Performing Arts, Brazilian Studies, and Francophone Studies. Adjoa is a BBC New Generation Thinker, with a growing portfolio of media work. Prior to her career as a public intellectual, Adjoa worked internationally as a showgirl. Adjoa's new book Elsie Houston: Revolutionary Soprano uncovers the story of the extraordinary Elsie Houston - a Brazilian, mixed-race, classically trained soprano who performed from Europe to the Americas.
Black British Classical Foundation is a registered charity that spotlights Black & South Asian classical musicians and opera singers. The charity has shone a light on some of the most inspiring and exciting young opera singers of today, among them Elizabeth Llewelyn and Nadine Benjamin.
If you have any access requirements that you’d like to discuss, please contact public.programmes@royalacademy.org.uk.