São Brás de Alportel names the Sounds Workshop after Father José da Cunha Duarte

The memory and legacy of Father José da Cunha Duarte, an essential figure in the cultural, social and community life of São Brás de Alportel, will be forever linked to the history of music in the municipality, through the municipality's Sound Workshop, which will now be called the "Father José da Cunha Duarte Sound Workshop".

The decision was approved by the municipal executive at the meeting on September 9, following a proposal from the elected members of the Socialist Party (PS) in the Municipal Council , as a “fair and deserved tribute to this major figure in the history of the municipality’s culture, for his valuable contribution to the cultural and social development of the municipality of São Brás de Alportel and the São Brás community”.

Having passed away on August 26th of this year at the age of 85, Father José da Cunha Duarte "leaves a legacy of inestimable value. In the musical field, he was the founder of the Parish Music School, the embryo of the São Brás de Alportel Youth Accordionists Group, as well as the São-Brasense Cultural Association, a group whose cultural activities are of paramount importance in the preservation of cultural traditions, and is responsible for the Music School, which is today a reference in the region," notes the City Council.

A man of vision, his work extended to multiple areas of the municipality's social and cultural life.

Its role in the creation of structures that would later mark local history is remembered, such as the Costume Museum and the António Bentes Cultural Center, "a reference space in the preservation and promotion of the Algarve's ethnographic heritage and community museography, which has received the highest recognition at a national level", according to the municipality.

The Sound Workshop, opened in 2012 and home to the São Brás Philharmonic Band, is now a central space in the municipality's cultural life, where generations intersect around music and where educational and intercultural projects take place involving schools, families and communities.

Regarding the naming of the Oficina dos Sons after Father Cunha, the municipality explains that "along with the attribution of toponymic designations to the streets and spaces in which we live, the attribution of names of patrons to public facilities available to the community also seeks to immortalize Memory, pay just tribute to the past and carry into the future the legacy of History, which belongs to everyone."