El Blog de Tritó » Orchestra

Commitment to music, by Javier Pérez Senz

Javier Pérez Senz — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 11:47:00 +0000

There are things that stir the music-lover’s memory, which bring back reminiscences of that irreplaceable experience which consists of listening to live music in its natural environment, the auditorium. For many fans, the recent recording of the symphonic rhapsody Catalonia, by Isaac Albéniz, at the hands of Jaime Martin and the Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya (OBC) will come as a pleasant surprise: the discovery of a score that exudes freshness, simplicity and melodic charm. For others, it will imply the rediscovery of a work that would be an obligatory part of the concert repertoire in any civilized country, but here, sadly, is not.

Its audition allows listeners to refresh their impressions and memories of great conductors and composers who, throughout their careers, demonstrated their belief in the value of this piece by their acts, without getting caught up in the widespread and sterile debate about Albéniz’s poor reputation as an orchestrator. Certainly, it is a marvel of refinement, but, when performed with full conviction of its merits, the listener is immediately captivated by the simplicity, the melodic inspiration and eternal freshness that permeate the Catalan composer’s music.

I am speaking of legendary musicians, such as the Russian Igor Markévitch, especially in his wonderful period of artistic involvement with the Orquesta Sinfónica de la RTVE; the Romanian Georges Enescu, stalwart defender of a piece that he often programmed, and all over the world; and Eduard Toldrà, the brilliant Catalan violinist, conductor and composer who, in 1944, created the Orquestra Municipal de Barcelona (now the OBC, which has at last recorded Catalonia), and who was a fervent promoter of the Spanish repertoire.

A greater commitment to music is needed and less obsession with attendance figures and box office takings.

There is a need for concert programmers who really believe in Spanish music.

The list includes musicians who are active at this time, such as Antoni Ros Marbà, a passionate perfomer of Albéniz and, in a very special way, of Toldrà, who was his teacher, Jesús López Cobos and José de Eusebio (thanks to his enthusiasm we now know more about the Camprodón musician’s operatic legacy than ever before; the recording discussed today includes an orchestral suite from Pepita Jiménez revised by him), and on his first CD with the OBC, Jaime Martin,

Albéniz had and has eloquent supporters. Why, then, is Catalonia still rarely heard in concert halls? Difficult question. First of all, there is a need for concert programmers who really believe in Spanish music. It is pointless to include just four or five pieces in a whole symphonic season; nor is the Spanish share of the programmes sufficient; nor are there enough commissions, increasingly unambitious and scarce. A greater commitment to music is needed and less obsession with attendance figures and box office takings.

There is enough leeway to balance the offer using the more popular classics to attract the general public –it all depends on the programmers’ imagination. The regularisation of works such as Catalonia – and this piece is just one example because there are hundreds of scores in the same situation – requires a strong alliance between performers, programmers and the public.

The musicians with power – and the chief conductors of a symphonic ensemble have a lot of power – are the ones who ultimately have a greater say when it comes to choosing which works are programmed and which are left out: when a chief conductor wants to play a given piece, eventually it gets played.

Programmers, managers and artistic directors should limit themselves to doing their duty, because the revival and dissemination of the national repertoire is an obligation for all orchestras, auditoriums and the concert-going public.

As for the public, the greatest possible complicity is needed, using the media that now, more than ever, can arouse – if used with imagination and efficiency – music-lovers’ curiosity, the desire to discover new and old scores, the possibility of expanding frontiers.

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Sincrotró-Alba: The premiere of the third symphony by Joan Guinjoan

Toni Cruanyes — Wed, 05 May 2010 08:30:42 +0000

On Friday 7 May, the expected premiere of Sincrotró-Alba, the third symphony by Joan Guinjoan, will take place. The work, organised into three movements, is fruit of a commission from the Synchrotron Consortium, whose particle accelerator in Cerdanyola del Vallès was inaugurated on 22 March, and who wish to celebrate its activation with an orchestral work inspired in the monumental scientific laboratory called Alba, which means ‘dawn’, a direct allusion to the first light of the morning, which dispels the darkness and unveils the landscape of a new day.

The programme, performed by the Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya (OBC) under the baton of Ernest Martínez Izquierdo, will be opened by the work The Unanswered Question by Charles Ives, and will conclude with Rachmaninov’s popular second piano concerto.

Sincrotró-Alba is the most important piece composed by Joan Guinjoan in the last few years.

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Hypermusic Prologue and Hèctor Parra in Accents

Leticia Martin — Wed, 06 May 2009 13:13:44 +0000

Issue no. 38 of the review Accents published by the Ensemble Intercontemporain is dedicated to Hèctor Parra’s Hypermusic Prologue.

Hypermusic Prologue is a unique project for intercommunication between science, music and art. It explores the traditional opera form in order to generate a type of dramatic expression for the 21st century, its ideas and creative processes, including recent research into physics and its parallelisms in music and art.

The main character, a composer and scientist, experiences deep tension between his “earthly love” and his “passion for knowledge”. This tension is built up dramatically through the contradictions between his life with his lover, limited in space and time, and his conviction that there is a much bigger world waiting to be explored.

This opera represents an opportunity to foster the search for more expressive forms for the drama and the musical possibilities. Its object is to find aesthetic structural connections through sound between that most abstract of the arts – music – and the highest concepts of theoretical physics, as researched by Lisa Randall and others. We hope the result will be a novel and fascinating creative experience.

The review is free and can be downloaded here.

A symphonic spring for Ramon Humet

Leticia Martin — Mon, 04 May 2009 14:53:21 +0000

This season is proving to be a prolific one as regards Ramón Humet’s symphonic activity. The performances of “Escenas de pájaros” by the Montreal Symphony Orchestra conducted by Roberto Minczuk and the OBC conducted by Rubén Gimeno have been followed by a premiere: “Sol de primavera”, a work commissioned by the Auditorio Nacional de Música to mark its 20th anniversary. The work was performed for the first time on the 3 May at the Auditorio Nacional, and on 5 May at the Auditori Nacional de Cataluña, by the JONC conducted by Manel Valdivieso.

Following this premiere, Ramón Humet will also be present at the Festival de Verano (Summer Festival) in Tarragona, where “Gagaku” will be premiered by the OBC, who will also play “Un vent transparent” at the Auditorio de Vilaseca on 19 June.

El Gato con Botas (Puss in Boots), reduction for piano

Leticia Martin — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 14:36:40 +0000

El gato con Botas, an opera by Xavier Montsalvatge with a libretto by Nestor Luján based on the story by C. Perrault, has been newly published as a reduced version for piano and voice.

This opera, composed by the Catalan composer in 1948, is one of the liveliest examples of contemporary Spanish opera and has been staged on several occasions – the latest was a co-production by the Teatro Real and the Liceu – both in its original version and as the adaptation made in 1996 by Albert Guinovart for chamber ensemble.

Gianandrea Noseda conducts Albéniz and Granados

Leticia Martin — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 14:04:48 +0000

The recent tour of the Orquesta de Cadaqués, conducted by Gianandrea Noseda, with concerts in Girona (28 April) and Zaragoza (29 Abril) focussed on Spanish music. The repertoire consisted of pieces by Isaac Albéniz, to mark the centenary of his death, and Enrique Granados, and their works were interpreted using the orchestrations that Albert Guinovart was commissioned to write by Tritó Edicions.

The Orquesta de Cadaqués presented four pieces from the Suite Española (Cadiz, Asturias, Cordoba and Sevilla) by Albéniz as well as his Canciones Italianas, interpreted by Ainhoa Arteta. Las Tonadillas by Enrique Granados completed a first part in which the Orquesta de Cadaqués, Gianandrea Noseda and Ainhoa Arteta paid their own special homage to Spanish music.

The concert programme was completed by F. Schubert’s Symphony nº 4.

David del Puerto presents his third symphony in Cordoba

Leticia Martin — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 17:05:49 +0000

On Thurday 16 April, at the Gran Teatro at 21:00 hrs, and as part of the busy programme of the Festival Cosmopoética held in Córdoba during March and April, David del Puerto’s third symphony, “En la melancolía de tu recuerdo, Soria”, was presented. It is a work commissioned by the Otoño Musical Soriano and composed in 2007.

Antonio Machado’s poems are the focal point of the work, with José Sacristán as the recitalist and the singers Elena Gragera and Carmen Gurriarán. The orquesta de Córdoba and the conductor Marco de Prósperis, together with these soloists, were given the task of presenting this large-scale work at the poetry festival. This is piece that signifies a point of inflection in the music of the composer David del Puerto.

See www.cosmopoetica.es for further.

New CD with symphonic works by Jesus Torres

Leticia Martin — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 16:13:50 +0000

This is the first monographic CD of orchestral works by the composer Jesús Torres (Zaragoza, 1965), one of the leading composers of his generation, who in the words of Jose Luis Téllez “attracts attention for both the maturity and the perfection of his writing and the speed and self-assurance with which the musician from Aragon has managed to define a personal style almost right from the beginning”.

The first work, “Sinfonía”, which was commissioned by the Orquesta de RTVE and its conductor Adrian Leaper to mark the 40th anniversary of the ensemble, is one of the composer’s most ambitious pieces to date. The writing of a symphonic work is a great challenge which the composer dealt with very successfully.

The other two works, on a smaller scale, were also the result of commissions. “Movimiento” was commissioned as the final piece in the 2004 Cadaquès Orchestra Conducting Competition. The recording was conducted by the Italian Gianandrea Noseda.

“Partita” was commissioned by the Joven Orquesta Nacional de España (JONDE) in 1998, when Jesus Torres was the in-house composer with this ensemble. Although it was written for only fifteen instruments it is a synthesis of orchestral composition.

Benguerel, Martínez Izquierdo and Rueda, at the CDMC

Leticia Martin — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:55:24 +0000

On Monday 23 March, the Orquesta de Cadaqués ensemble, under the baton of Alejandro Posada, interpreted a programme that included three fundamental works by the composers Xavier Benguerel (Hexagrama), Ernest Martínez Izquierdo (Norte-Sur) and Jesús Rueda (Chamber concerto no 2).

These three works, written in very different languages, present part of the current Spanish music scene.

The concert was completed by one of Arnold Schonberg’s masterworks, Ode to Napoleon, with a solo contribution by the baritone and actor David Moss.

Further information at: http://cdmc.mcu.es/

The Pyrenean Symphony by Guridi included in this season’s Orquesta de RTVE programming

Leticia Martin — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 13:11:18 +0000

On 19 and 20 March, the Pyrenean Symphony by Jesús Guridi (1886-1961) was presented in Madrid as part of this season’s ORTVE programming at its home in the Teatro Monumental in Madrid. The conductor was Pablo Gonzalez.

In this work Guridi evokes “the spirit of the mountains and the dangers existing there”. It is a very colourful work with descriptive traits. Its modal and rhythmic character clearly expresses the composer’s inspiration in Basque popular music, translated in this work into the characteristic symphonic language of the 20th century.

The writer Gerardo Diego summed up his impressions of the work in a review where he concluded as follows: “And Spanish music can now lay claim to a symphony that may be compared without hesitation with the illustrious Alpine, Cevennian and Carpathian heights and pinnacles of the musical landscape.”