‘Camões na Eternidade do Tempo,’ the title of the concert program, features two works by composer Nuno Côrte-Real: ‘Se misericórdia e amor não vos atara,’ based on the sonnet ‘Cristo Atado à Coluna’ by Camões, and ‘Time Stands Still,’ inspired by seven songs from the English Renaissance master John Dowland, interspersed with instrumental interludes dedicated to contemporary composers like António Pinho Vargas and Mats Lidström.
The concert will showcase performances by soprano Ana Quintans as the soloist and actor Vitor D’Andrade in recitation, along with Ensemble Darcos under the direction of Nuno Côrte-Real.
This event, part of the Música na Universidade de Lisboa program, is also included in the Temporada Darcos. It will be presented tonight at the Centro de Artes e Criatividade in Torres Vedras, the city where the Darcos association is based.
‘Se misericórdia e amor não vos atara,’ which takes its title from the first line of the sonnet, was commissioned by the Jerónimos Monastery to Nuno Côrte-Real as part of the fifth centenary celebrations of Luís de Camões’s birth. The commission centers on a stone relief, located at the monastery’s refectory entrance, depicting Christ tied to a column.
In 2022, when the sonnet was discovered in a 17th-century manuscript, Nuno Júdice (1949-2024) commented that Camões presents a “non-orthodox idea” within the context of the prevailing Catholicism of the time, highlighting love’s liberating aspect. Júdice noted the poet describes Christ as being tortured, yet free through “his love for humanity.”
Nuno Côrte-Real translates the poem into music, initially recited and then sung, consistently “enveloped in a musical fabric at times dreamlike, passionate, tense, abrupt, pulsing, and discordant, in a timbral play of lyricism,” as described in the work’s commentary.
The recited version of ‘Se misericórdia e amor não vos atara’ was performed in June last year during the official launch of the celebrations for the 500th anniversary of Camões’s birth.
‘Camões na Eternidade do Tempo’ is further highlighted with the performance of ‘Time Stands Still,’ an earlier work by Côrte-Real, commissioned by the Centro Cultural de Belém for the Dias da Música Festival in 2019.
This composition integrates John Dowland’s seven songs, which vary in mood from melancholic to lively, consistently expressive, interspersed with a short instrumental piece, showcasing Côrte-Real’s affinities with diverse musical domains.
‘Time Stands Still’ is described as an “informal and unpretentious symbiosis,” according to the presentation, which includes composers Sérgio Azevedo, António Pinho Vargas, Eurico Carrapatoso, Christopher Bochmann, and Mats Lidström, as well as singer Maria João (‘Lady Maria João’s Improvisation’), culminating in Fernando Pessoa’s last words: ‘I know not what tomorrow will bring.’
In Torres Vedras, the concert ‘Camões na Eternidade do Tempo’ begins at 21:30. In Lisbon, at the Pavilhão de Portugal auditorium, it starts on Friday at 21:00, with free entry limited to the venue’s capacity.
The Pavilhão de Portugal, designed by architect Álvaro Siza for Expo’98, reopened on April 30, integrated into the academic and cultural strategy of the University of Lisbon, featuring the exhibition ‘Meu matalote e amigo Luís de Camões.’
