This year marks 200 years since the proclamation of Brazil’s independence, by Dom Pedro I in September 1822. Developed in collaboration with the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The ‘Music of Brazil’ series presents around 100 orchestral, chamber, choral and vocal works from the 19th and 20th centuries will be recorded by the country’s top orchestras, ensemble and artists. Heitor Villa-Lobos once confessed that he loved to write string quartets, stating ‘one could say that it is a mania’. His 17 quartets form a substantial part of his chamber music output, covering a long career that embraced national pride and musical experimentation leading to the rarefied atmosphere of the final masterpieces. Often drawing on the musical folklore of Brazil, these quartets are an outpouring of spontaneous and daring invention. Ranging from austere polyphony to compelling expressiveness and virtuosity, they represent one of the most distinctive bodies of chamber works in 20th-century music. Villa-Lobos is best known for his orchestral works, and this Marco Polo edition of the complete String Quartets seeks to redress the balance towards his substantial chamber music output while joining our highly collectable Naxos editions of the Complete Symphonies (8.506039), and the Bachianas Brasileiras (8.557460-62). Pianist Sonia Rubinsky won a Latin GRAMMY for her recordings of the solo piano music (8.508013).