ABSTRACT
Research into the recordings of popular music by bandas de música (wind bands) in the early twentieth century is a new theme for Brazilian musicology. Its choice was motivated primarily by my experience as a professional musician, a member of the Rio de Janeiro Fire Department Band for the last 20 years, and also by my work as a researcher. In my master’s thesis, I highlighted the importance of the critical edition as a useful tool for the preservation and dissemination of works composed by the conductor Anacleto de Medeiros (1866–1907), a central figure in the history of wind bands in Brazil (Souza 2003), whereas in my Ph.D. I addressed historical, technical, and aesthetic questions about the early Brazilian wind band recordings, with an emphasis on an interpretive aspect central to the organization of musical meaning: the tempo (Souza 2009).
