French composer Darius Milhaud was very interested in polytonality as an expressive tool in which he combined various key centers and chords together. His Saudades do Brasil, written around 1920 after his stay in Brazil, are a perfect example of this. Borrowing the rhythms and flavors he discovered by studying the music of Ernesto Nazareth, Milhaud has succeeded in creating a collection of twelve musical portraits that demonstrate his longing for the places and people of Brazil while asserting himself as a leading figure of French music in the 20th century.

Alberto Ginastera was an Argentinian composer known for his contribution to musical nationalism in the Americas in the mid-1900s. His Danzas Argentinas, written in 1937, belong to the compositional period he referred to as “objective nationalism”. Each of the three pieces in this opus exemplifies this through the use of direct and indirect elements recalling Argentinian folk music traditions, from specific rhythm to intervals associated with the open strings of a guitar.

This album was recorded in Los Angeles and released in 2016. Artwork by Steph Nowotarski.