GMCD 7243 You can order this CD in our E-Shop under Choral Music/Coro Cervantes Reviews ***Sound Clips***	O Crux Spanish Choral Music CORO CERVANTES - CARLOS FERNÁNDEZ ARANSAY director   Debra Skeen - solo soprano [5] Mark Dobell - solo tenor [12] Anthony Hawgood - solo tenor [14] Lucy Crowe - solo soprano [17] TANSY CASTLEDINE organ

Contents:

DDD 79.38 Recorded: Exeter College, Oxford 1–3 July 2000

Nineteenth century Spanish sacred music? It is remarkable that there was any sacred music at all when one reviews the political vicissitudes of 19^th century Spain. In 1808, Napoleonic troops crossed the Pyrenees - the French emperor had decided to annex the Iberian Peninsula - and the Spanish people rose up in arms to defend their country. For the music chapels of Spanish churches and cathedrals, the conflict amounted to a complete disaster: the French seized temples, relics and works of art, imposed substantial ecclesiastical tributes, dismantled music chapels, reduced the number of convents by a third, and the king, José I, went so far as to suppress all male religious orders (these subsequently reappeared later in the century). In 1836, after the death of the absolutist monarch and supporter of the French, King Fernando VII, minister Juan Álvarez de Mendizábal decreed the confiscation of ecclesiastical assets, the first of many actions that would gradually impoverish the patrimony of the Catholic Church. It was at this stage that some of the most important music chapels and valuable religious traditions and styles disappeared forever. Finally, in 1851 the Church and State signed a Concordat, which reduced the size of music chapels, abolished schools for child choristers and banned anyone who was not a clergyman from performing music in churches. This last demand meant that a number of professional musicians abandoned sacred music altogether and standards of sacred musical performance worsened dramatically. It was not until 1903, when Pope Pius X made public the Motu Proprio, that the importance and rigour of the performance of sacred music was re-established. In Spain, it gave rise to the 1^st National Congress of Sacred Music in 1907. 

From the start of the 19^th century, a taste for everything Italian had prevailed in Spanish music, especially in vocal and theatrical repertoire: Italian opera was supreme in Europe. It is not surprising, therefore, that it is impossible to find one main trend in Spanish sacred music of the time, and there was a general retrospection in all its forms. One can certainly find individual efforts, which helped maintain the Spanish sacred tradition throughout the century, but these are the exception rather than the rule. One other important phenomenon that contributed to maintaining the tradition was the creation in Cataluńa, of the first choral societies known as orfeones halfway through the century (these had already appeared in the rest of Europe at the beginning of the century).

Thus, 19^th century Spanish music incorporated a multiplicity of styles, which was reflected in the sacred music of the time; a type of music for which there was a great demand. The efforts of the more classical Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga (1806-1826), a prodigy born in Bilbao, and the Catalan guitarist Fernando Sor (1778-1839), followed more Italianate works like those of the organist from Aragón Nicolás Ledesma (1791-1883). Many composers endeavoured to convey the real essence of “Spanishness” and wrote much symphonic, chamber and sacred music. This was so of the violinist Jesús de Monasterio (1836-1903), born in Cantabria, and others, better known today as the authors of famous zarzuelas, Tomás Bretón (1850-1923), from Salamanca, Francisco Asenjo Barbieri (1823-1894), from Madrid, and Amadeo Vives (1871-1932), from Barcelona. Hilarión Eslava (1807-1878), a clergyman from Navarra, and the Catalan Felipe Pedrell (1841-1922), made every effort to update Spanish sacred music, freeing it from any dubious exotic touches and frivolousness, and their legacy is as educators and editors of the national music heritage. Some composers, for instance, the Basque chapel master and clergyman Vicente Goicoechea (1854-1916) used this legacy as the source for their inspiration. Others looked ahead and assimilated all national elements, combining them with their own personal languages and trends from the rest of Europe. The three undisputed Spanish geniuses, great composers and pianists in their own right, Isaac Albéniz (1860-1909), Enrique Granados (1867-1916) and Manuel de Falla (1876-1946) fall into this category.

Page revised 26.06.03