Alborada del Gracioso 

Maurice Ravel

Maurice Ravel was born March 7, 1875 of parents of Swiss and Basque descent in Ciboure, Basses-Pyrénées. He died December 28, 1937 in Paris.The orchestral version of Alborada del Gracioso was completed in 1918 and received its world premiere in Boston on May 17, 1919 with Rhené-Baton conducting the Pasdeloup Orchestra. Acknowledged for his brilliant orchestrations, Ravel made significant contributions in a wide variety of genres, including solo piano, chamber music, songs, ballets, symphonic works, and operas. The work is scored for piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, English horn, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion (xylophone, crotales, triangle, cymbals, tambourine, castanets, side drum, bass drum), 2 harps, and strings.

Ravel originally conceived his Alborada del Gracioso (The Jester’s Morning Song) as the fourth movement of his Miroirs for solo piano in 1905, a year that marked the beginning of an astonishingly active creative period. Each version of the piece is a virtuoso tour de force.

The Alborada, as its Hispanic name suggests, is permeated with a Spanish atmosphere no less distinct than the composer’s more frequently-performed Boléro. A clear evocation of guitar and castanets are easily discerned in the piano version of the piece. While the orchestral version uses actual castanets, the guitar figuration is imitated by means of the traditional orchestral string instruments playing pizzicato and col legno (with the wood of the bow) and by using rapid repeated notes in the trumpet. The structure of the piece falls into three distinct sections, the outer parts of which are light and dance-like. The slower middle section begins with a bassoon solo and features a languorous melody in the lower strings, each phrase of which is punctuated by the dance rhythms from the opening measures of the piece.

Concierto de Aranjuez for Guitar and Orchestra 

Joaquín Rodrigo

Joaquín Vidre Rodrigo was born November 22, 1901 in Sagunto and died July 6, 1999 in Madrid. One of Spain’s greatest composers, Rodrigo composed his Concierto de Aranjuez in 1939. Its premiere took place November 9, 1940 in Barcelona’s Palau de la Música, with guitarist Regino Sainz de la Maza performing with the Orquesta Filarmónica de Barcelona under the direction of César Mendoza Lasalle. It is scored for solo guitar, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, and strings.

Joaquín Rodrigo, a composer deeply rooted in the soil and soul of his native Spain, emerged as his country’s most important composer in the second half of the twentieth century, assuming the place previously held by his mentor, Manuel de Falla. Rodrigo’s earliest musical education was in Spain, but starting in 1927 he pursued further training in Paris at the École Normale de Musique where he studied with Paul Dukas. While in Paris, Rodrigo also came into contact with other prominent composers, including Ravel, Honegger, Milhaud, and above all his compatriot, Falla, whose encouragement was critical to Rodrigo’s later success. Rodrigo’s music has enjoyed considerable acclaim both within the borders of his country and beyond. Among his list of honors are the Gran Cruz de Alfonso X el Sabio, the Légion d’Honneur, membership in the Académie Royale des Scences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts of Belgium, and many honorary doctorates. In 1996 he was awarded Spain’s highest distinction, the Prince of Asturias Prize—the first composer to be so named. At age ninety he and his wife, the Turkish pianist Victoria Kahmi, were bestowed the honorary title, “Marquéses de los Jardines de Aranjuez.” Blind from the age of three, Rodrigo, produced nearly 170 compositions of various types, several of which are written for that quintessential Spanish instrument, the guitar. While many of his works are performed outside of Spain, none has assumed a more beloved place in the international repertoire than the Concierto de Aranjuez.

The title of the piece draws its name from the royal palace of Aranjuez, a town near and dear to the composer’s heart, as he and his wife spent their honeymoon there. The work is in three movements, beginning with a lively Allegro con spirito whose opening rhythmic figuration in the solo guitar dominates the entire movement. The violins then introduce an attractive and vigorous tune, which the soloist soon up in a more elaborated form. The movement continues in high spirits, punctuated by many piquant touches of orchestration.

The emotional heart and soul of the Concierto de Aranjuez lies in its slow movement—the work’s longest. This poignant Adagio begins with a solo in the English horn, accompanied by gentle strumming in the solo. As its soulful journey unfolds, its melancholy dreaminess gives way to real drama, culminating in an extended cadenza for the soloist that reaches a shattering climax that yields to the most impassioned statement of the movement’s principal melody. Rodrigo was typically taciturn when asked what meaning lay behind this Adagio, simply saying that it reflected his response to the landscape of Aranjuez. Some have speculated that it embodies the composer’s feelings about the Spanish Civil War. According to guitarist Pepe Romero, who was a close acquaintance of Rodrigo, the movement was conceived at the piano when the composer learned that his wife, Victoria, became deathly ill during her pregnancy with their first child. Victoria, who remained his faithful companion until her death in 1997, survived, but sadly, the child did not. One further note about the Adagio—fans of jazz trumpeter Miles Davis may recall Gil Evans’ remarkable and controversial arrangement of this movement, and Davis’ artistry, on the landmark recording, Sketches of Spain (1960).

All sadness is swept aside in the light and airy Allegro gentile last movement. This gentle dance in triple meter is all friendliness and sunshine, with plenty of guitar virtuosity to boot.

Suite from the Three-Cornered Hat 

Manuel de Falla

Manuel de Falla (y Matheu ) was born November 23, 1876 in Cádiz, Spain and died November 14, 1946 in Alta Garcia, Argentina. The Three-Cornered Hat began as a two-act pantomime with the title The Corregidor and the Miller’s Wife. It was composed in 1916-17 and received its first performance in this form April 7, 1917 in Madrid under the baton of Joaquín Turina. In 1918-19, the composer expanded the work into a two-act ballet now retitled, The Three-Cornered Hat. This version was first performed by Diaghilev’s famous Ballets Russes on July 22, 1919 in London under the direction of Ernest Ansermet. The choreography was created by Léonide Massine and the scenic design and costumes were made by Pablo Picasso. It is scored for 2 flutes (2 piccolos), 2 oboes, English horn, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion (snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, castanets, tam-tam, xylophone), harp, celesta, piano, and strings.

Falla emerged in the first half of the twentieth century to become Spain’s most prominent composer. Fully immersed in his native culture, the composer moved to Paris in 1907, where he mingled with the likes of Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel, Paul Dukas, Igor Stravinsky, and his fellow countryman Albéniz. He remained there until the outbreak of the First World War. Upon his return to Spain, Falla consolidated his preeminence among Spanish composers as well as establishing his international reputation with works such as El amor brujo (Love the Magician), La vida breve, Noches en los jardines de España (Nights in the Gardens of Spain) and the work at hand. He composed very little after 1926, at which time he moved to Mallorca. In 1939 he moved to Argentina, where he remained the rest of his life.

Pedro Antonio de Alarcón y Ariza’s novel, The Three-Cornered Hat (El sombrero de tres picos), gave rise to at least two significant musical compositions, one of which being Hugo Wolf’s opera, Der Corregidor, first performed in 1896. Another was the pantomime written by Spain’s foremost composer of the first half of the twentieth century, Manuel de Falla, under the title The Corregidor and the Miller’s Wife (El corregidor y la molinera). In Spanish culture, a corregidor is a magistrate (literally, “corrector”)—an administrative figure with judicial powers. Prone as they were to abuse of power, corregidors also became the subject of satire, as in Alarcón’s novel.

The plot of the ballet involves a triangle that includes the corregidor, a miller, and the miller’s wife. Spaniards admire figures who flaunt authority, and the principal figures of this story play their respective roles very nicely. The symbol of the corregidor’s authority is his three-cornered hat, hence the title of the farce. We need not concern ourselves with all the twists and turns of the rather slight plot of the ballet, but it is enough to know that all the action takes place on midsummer’s eve—ever a time for fantastic events—and there is plenty of feigned flirtation, mistaken identity, and the inevitable comeuppance of the foolish old magistrate. Local color also abounds, as the suite from the ballet beautifully captures. Two suites were derived from the complete ballet: “Scenes and Dances from El Sombrero de tres picos” (Part I) and “Three Dances from El Sombrero de tres picos” (Part II). This concert by the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra will present the second of these suites, comprising the “Neighbor’s Dance” (Seguidillas), “Miller’s Dance” (Farruca) and “Final Dance” (Jota).

España, Rhapsody for Orchestra 

Emmanuel Chabrier

French composer (Alexis) Emmanuel Chabrier was born in Ambert, Puy-de-Dôme, January 18, 1841 and died in Paris on September 13, 1894. His most famous work is the orchestral rhapsody España. According to the 2nd edition of the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Chabrier’s most significant output were songs, piano pieces and stage works. Despite the small number of works he composed, they are considered to be of high quality and proved influential on French composers in the first quarter of the 20th century. España was originally composed for piano and was later transcribed for orchestra by the composer. It was premiered on November 4, 1883 and was dedicated to the conductor Charles Lamoureux, who conducted the first public performance at the Théâtre du Château d’Eau for Paris’s Société des Nouveaux Concerts. The work is scored for piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 4 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 cornets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, 2 harps, and strings.

The allure of Spain proved too strong for composers from other countries to resist. Maurice Ravel, although French, was half Basque and his Boléro, Alborada del gracioso, and Rhapsodie Espagnole are ample evidence of his affinity for Spanish musical idioms. Emmanuel Chabrier was another Frenchman who fell in love with Spain, its culture, and its music, largely as a result of the time he spent there in 1882. He wrote to a friend in November of that year:

In a month I must leave adorable Spain and say good-bye to the Spaniards—because (I say this only to you) they are very nice, the little girls. . . . Every evening we go to the café-concerts where the Malagueñas, the Soledas, the Zapateados and the Peteneras are sung. Then the dances, absolutely Arab, to speak truth. If you could see them wiggle, unjoint the hips, contort, I believe you would not try to get away!

España makes use of two song/dances—the Malagueña and Jota. Opulently orchestrated, the soul of the guitar and castanets is never far away.