Sospiro

Programme Notes
Like many neighbouring nations, the kingdoms of Portugal and Spain experienced numerous periods of closeness – symbolised not only by the many marriages between noble families, but also by moments of great tension and war. Probably more than at any other time in history, the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries witnessed the greatest alternation between union and division among the kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula, which were even united under a single crown between 1580 and 1640.

Some of the clearest evidence of this proximity can be found in the art produced during this period: Portuguese composers and poets, for example, wrote in both Portuguese and Castilian. Notable examples include the many plays in Castilian by Gil Vicente (c.1465–c.1536) – the foremost poet of the Portuguese Renaissance – as well as the numerous villancicos in Castilian preserved in Portuguese songbooks.
Two instruments stand out across these three centuries: the vihuela (or viola de mão in Portugal) and the guitar (or viola in Portugal). The extraordinary quality of the repertoire by Spanish vihuelists such as Luys de Narváez and Luys Milán, among others, found no equivalent in Portugal during the 16th century – or at least no printed books or manuscripts containing music by Portuguese vihuela composers have survived to the present day. Nevertheless, the presence of the vihuela in Portugal is abundantly documented, both in 16th-century iconography and literary sources.
The repertoire for the Baroque guitar – or viola in Portugal, however, developed in both countries in comparable quantity and quality. While Spain was home to figures such as Gaspar Sanz, Francisco Guerau, and Santiago de Murcia, all icons of the instrument’s repertoire, Portugal offers us Cifras de Viola – Musical Manuscript 97 of the General Library of the University of Coimbra [P-Cug MM 97], copied at the beginning of the 18th century by Joseph Carneyro Tavares Lamecense – the most extensive single-instrument manuscript in the entire Iberian Peninsula up to the 18th century, dedicated in this case to the Baroque guitar.
This journey through the music of the vihuela and Baroque guitar in Portugal and Spain across three centuries – much like the political history marked by love, war, rapprochement, and tension between the two countries – reveals both the parallels and the singularities of the nations that together form the stone raft of the Iberian Peninsula.

Tiago Matias
Originally from Aveiro, Portugal, Tiago Matias completed the Advanced Coursein Classical Guitar at the Aveiro Calouste Gulbenkian Conservatory of Music in 2002, receiving the top mark of 20 in his final guitar examination. In 2005, he earned a degreein Guitar from the Lisbon School of Music. He has been awarded prizes in severalguitar competitions, notably the 1st Prize at Música en Compostela (Santiago de Compostela, 2004) and the 3rd Prize at the Legato Competition (Porto, 2000).

He regularly collaborates with ensembles such as the Portuguese SymphonyOrchestra, Ludovice Ensemble, Segréis de Lisboa, Sete Lágrimas, Casa da MúsicaBaroque Orchestra, and Divino Sospiro, among others. He has recorded 18 albums withsome of these groups and has performed in leading concert halls and music festivalsaround the world.

In 2012, together with Filipe Faria, he founded the early music ensemble Noa Noa with which he has released four albums. In 2021, he recorded and released his firstsolo album, Cifras de Viola, featuring previously unpublished Portuguese works for viola (baroque guitar). The album was one of four nominated for the Play Awards in thecategory of Best Classical/Art Music Album that year. In 2023, he released Sospiro, analbum for vihuela featuring transcriptions and arrangements of Portuguese Renaissancemusic. In the same year, he published a book of the same name, containing thetablatures and scores of the pieces recorded on the album. Fantasia, released in 2024, features contemporary music for solo theorbo composed specifically for him by fivePortuguese composers. The accompanying book with the music scores was alsopublished in 2024. Fantasia is the first album worldwide to consist entirely ofcontemporary music for solo theorbo. Also in 2024, he released Cordovil, dedicated to the complete surviving works for baroque guitar by José Ferreira Cordovil (c.1687–1761), marking the first ever recording of this repertoire. A book with transcriptions ofthe recorded works was published alongside the album. In 2025, he released his fifthsolo album, Sombras, featuring the complete unpublished works for baroque guitar byAntónio Marques Lésbio (1639–1709).

During the 2025/2026 season, he embarks on his first solo world tour, with 26 concertsacross 12 countries.

As a pedagogue, he has given masterclasses in lute and guitar and has taught bothinstruments at the Aveiro Calouste Gulbenkian Conservatory of Music and the NationalConservatory in Lisbon. He served as director of Quartel das Artes (Oliveira do Bairro) from 2018 to 2024. He is currently a researcher at the Centre for Classical andHumanistic Studies and a PhD candidate in Artistic Studies at the University of Coimbra.