Heitor Villa-Lobos

Heitor Villa-Lobos was born March 5, 1887, in Brazil and became the single most significant creative figure in 20th-century Brazilian art music. He played cello and classical guitar, and conducted, but composition was the engine: he poured out orchestral, chamber, instrumental, and vocal works at a scale that reached over 2,000 pieces by the time he died in 1959. His signature move was blending Brazilian folk music with the architecture of European classical form, most famously in the Bachianas Brasileiras (Brazilian Bach-pieces) and the Chôros. In 1929 he wrote his Etudes for classical guitar and dedicated them to Andrés Segovia; in 1940 he followed with 5 Preludes, dedicated to his spouse Arminda Neves d'Almeida, known as Mindinha. Both sets remain cornerstones of the classical guitar repertory. He died November 17, 1959, having made South American composition unmistakable on the global stage.