Preservation and technological obsolescence: Portuguese contemporary musical heritage in perspective

This paper seeks to put into perspective the current situation of preservation and performability of a certain Portuguese contemporary music, known as Portuguese musical avant-garde, focusing on the preservation of experimental music from 1960 onwards. This strives to problematise this sub- ject by not only presenting the creative context to these specific musical works but also the main priorities around their documentation and preservation. Furthermore, we also set out actual efforts to retrieve as many musical works as possible, specifically by gathering together all the facets of the musical works, including their magnetic tape recordings. In addition, this paper also approaches current composer concerns about the future survival of their own musical works.