Isaac Albéniz: Suite española, no. 1 and no. 2
Isaac Albeniz was a Spanish pianist and composer born in 1860 in Camprodon, a small city in Spain. A child prodigy, Albeniz played in public when he was only four years old. Three years later, he passed the entrance examination for piano performance at Paris Conservatoire but was too young to enroll. When he was 12 years old, Albeniz hid in a ship going to Buenos Aires, and then he transferred to United States from Cuba. He has travelled various countries and gave many worldwide performances to support himself. Four years later, when Isaac Albéniz was fifteen years old, he went back to Europe and studied at the Leipzig and Brussels concervatories. In 1893, he decided to live in Paris, where his works began to be taken seriously and respected.[1]
Isaac Albéniz was strongly influenced by folk music. In his music, the punteado (Plucking) and rasgueado (strumming) of the guitar improvisations, the syncopated rhythms imitating dancers' whirling and the Phrygian mode melodies are all frequently appeared in his compositions. In 1883, Albeniz met Felipe Pedrell, who was a famous Catalan composer, musicologist, and teacher in Spain. Also, Pedrell possessed a "fervent love of the homeland,"[2] and he inspired Albeniz to create the Suite española, which including all of above elements.
Albeniz wrote the Suite española, op. 47 for solo piano on 21 March 1887 to pay homage to the Queen of Spain. This collection includes eight pieces which describe different regions and musical styles in Spain. However, Albeniz only composed four pieces of this suite: “Granada,” “Cataluna,” “Sevilla,” and “Cuba.” After Albeniz’s death, the editor Hofmeister and Union Musical Espanola published these four pieces and also added other four pieces: “Cadiz,” “Asturias,” “Aragon,” and “Castilla.”[3] It is interesting that we do not know whether Albeniz planned to compose these four pieces.
“Granada” is the first piece of the Suite española. Its subtitle is “Serenata,” suggesting calm and light music played in the evening, a suggestion borne out in the song-like melody that runs through the whole piece pianissimo. The music opens with incessant “strummed” chords in the right hand, imitating a guitar-like figuration and the theme is unusually placed in the tenor voice. A four-bar transition brings us to the B section, which the music is also song-like. The melody, however, is taken by soprano with right hand and implies a dialogue between the A and B section. Finally, this piece ends with a four measure arpeggiation coda.
Compared to other master piano repertoires, the form and style of the Suite española, Op. 47 No.2 are not particular. However, it does have distinctiveness in compositional techniques. The Suite española, Op. 47 No.2 is “Cataluna,” which subtitled Curranda. It is one of the few pieces Albeniz inspired by his original hometown Cantaluna. The Curranda is a traditional Catalonian dance rooted in the Italian Corrente and the French Courante. The typical Curranda pattern – triple meters with one of two active beats followed by two relatively restful ones, with the third beat having a feeling of rhythmic climax – dominating rhythmic patterns in this work. “Cataluna” opens in a tranquil atmosphere. A D ties in almost four measures with dotted quarter notes in each third beat played by the right hand alternating to the left hand. The repetitious rhythmic pattern leads to the climax, which is all dotted rhythm with fortissimo followed by the theme in measure 31. It is interesting that composer doesn’t give any dynamic marks until the first fortissimo emerged in the climax, and only two – ff and mf presented in this work. To illustrate this point, he used other ways to give the performers a clue what kind of sonorities should be sound. For example, he wrote una corda in measure 15, which requests performers hold down the left pedal to lower the sound so that it has contrasting color with the previous similar section. In addition, he added more notes in every chord to intensify the sound effects which implies the climax coming instead of write a crescendo directly as usual. When theme comes back in measure 48, the left hand added a rapid moving voice with sixteenth notes to emphasize passionate emotion of the Currante dance, and four-measure ascending parallel scales followed by the four brilliant chords guide audience to the end. The whole music suggests hunting-like song in the Romantic period.
Suite española, Op. 47 presents audiences with vividly descriptive elements of Spanish folk music and refreshing writing techniques. Whether "Granada's" guitar–like figuration and relation to Moorish music or the lively Spanish style courante of “Cantaluna,” every piece in this suite refers to a different region with its distinguishing traits and reveals Albeniz’s nationalistic characteristics. Albeniz wrote a letter to his friend Enrique Moarages: “I live and write a Serenata, romantic to the point of paroxysm and sad to the point of despair, among the aroma of the flowers, the shade of the cypresses, and the snow of the Sierra. I want the Arabic Granada, that which is all art, which is all that seems to me beauty and emotion.”[4] Albeniz created both delightful and melancholy affection to the folkloric traits music in multifarious compositional features. That is an attractive point to listen his music. Compared other massive piano repertoires, However, the Suite española, Op. 47 is not enough impressive or influential on its compositional invention and creativities. I suppose that is why this suite is not a part of the canon.
Barulich, Frances. "Albéniz, Isaac." In Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com (accessed February 24, 2010).
Clark, Walter Aaron. Issac Albeniz: Portrait of a Romantic, Oxford University Press, 1999
Sinclair, A. T. "Folk-Songs and Music of Cataluña." The Journal of American Folklore, Vol. 23, No. 88 (Apr. - Jun., 1910), pp. 171-178
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