Seven Movements from "Missa Festiva" (1817) of Marcos Portugal (1762–1830): A Vocal Score with Critical Commentary

Marcos António da Fonseca Portugal (1762–1830) is considered by several Luso-Brazilian musicologists to be the most prolific and influential Portuguese composer in history, having impacted the Portuguese and Brazilian music scene significantly during his lifetime. Marcos Portugal achieved international fame for his large-scale works, which include sacred compositions, Italian opera seria, as well as farsas and opera buffa in Portuguese. Despite the reputation he achieved during his lifetime, today his works are understudied and underperformed, even in Lusophone countries. Such an oversight is noticeable particularly as regards his sacred music corpus. For this reason, I have chosen Missa Festiva (1817) as the subject of this dissertation. Creating a vocal score of the solo, duo and trio movements of Missa Festiva will be helpful not only for performers, but also for scholars and conductors who wish study this work. A vocal score makes accessible the performance of individual movements when only piano, organ, or another keyboard instrument is available. By facilitating the performance and analysis of Missa Festiva, this document will contribute to the work's dissemination and to a better understanding of the value of early nineteenth-century Luso-Brazilian virtuosic vocal sacred music. The manuscript used for the transcription and orchestral reduction into a vocal score of movements III-IX is BR-Rcm MS CRI-SM59 from the Acervo Musical do Cabido Metropolitano do Rio de Janeiro, from 1818 (images included in the dissertation).