Eurico Carrapatoso (b. 1962, Mirandela) is the winner of the 2021 DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble Composition Award.

Considered one of the most important contemporary Portuguese composers, Eurico Carrapatoso has an extensive catalogue that includes symphonic works, operas, chamber music for various ensembles, and choral music. Since 1989, he has been a Professor of Composition at the Conservatório Nacional and regularly receives commissions from national and international cultural institutions. His works have been performed, published, and disseminated across Europe and other continents since 1992. His music represented Portugal three times at the UNESCO International Composers’ Tribune in Paris, in 1998, 1999, and 2006. He has received numerous distinctions, including the Sociedade Portuguesa de Autores Prize in 2017, as well as the first editions of the Lopes-Graça Composition Prize (1997), the Francisco de Lacerda Prize (1999), and the Jesús García-Bernalt Prize from the University of Salamanca (2021). In 2004, he was decorated by the President of the Republic as Commander of the Order of Prince Henry. 

The DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble Composition Prize aims to recognize, encourage, and promote contemporary Portuguese art music composition. It is awarded biennially to honor the work and distinguished trajectory of a leading Portuguese composer. Presented by the DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble, it is the largest Composition Prize in Portugal, valued at €5,000, and is supported by the Directorate-General for the Arts. In 2019, in its first edition, the DSCH – Schostakovich Composition Prize was awarded to the composer Luís Tinoco.

The DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble is currently regarded as one of the leading ensembles on the international scene. Based in Lisbon since its founding in 2006 by the pianist and artistic director Filipe Pinto-Ribeiro, the DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble is made up of internationally acclaimed musicians and has a discography that includes albums dedicated to Shostakovich and Beethoven, released by the French label Paraty and distributed by Harmonia Mundi PIAS, which have received the highest accolades from both national and international specialized critics.

The 2021 DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble Composition Prize will be awarded to Eurico Carrapatoso at the next DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble concert at the Centro Cultural de Belém on November 28, 2021.

The concert is entitled “The Beginning and the End of Time” and will be performed by the DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble – consisting of Filipe Pinto-Ribeiro, Pascal Moraguès, Esther Hoppe, and Christian Poltéra – featuring three works dedicated to the fascinating theme of “time”: the famous “Quartet for the End of Time” by Olivier Messiaen, one of the most iconic works of the 20th century, composed and premiered in a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp, set against the horrors and tragedies of World War II and the hope of overcoming this apocalyptic “time”; “Círculo,” Opus 91 by the Spanish composer Joaquín Turina, also called “Fantastic Trio,” which reflects the “circular” course of time over the span of a day; but the main highlight of the concert is the Portuguese premiere of Eurico Carrapatoso’s new work entitled “Pour la Fin, pour mon Commencement” – following its world premiere in Madrid at the SONY Auditorium on November 25, performed by the DSCH – Schostakovich Ensemble – a work in which, in the composer’s own words, he sought to:

“just as in Quatuor pour la fin du temps, where Messiaen reviews his works written between the 1920s and the year of its composition, 1940, I also make in this work a retrospective of gestures representative of my output over the past twenty years of uninterrupted creative activity, from the daring element to the tendency that has emerged in recent times toward a more sober and concise character, as evident in the simplicity of the central movement, the piano solo, which evokes Dulcinea del Toboso, “lady of my soul, day of my night, glory of my sorrows, compass of my paths”, as if a Don Quixote were there singing the eternal feminine; and, finally, passing through that diagonal that has traversed my music since I found my voice, so well expressed in the slow and introspective movements.”

Concert
28.11.2021
Centro Cultural de Belém
https://www.ccb.pt/evento/dsch-schostakovich-ensemble-2/