JOAQUÍN TURINA: El castillo de Almodóvar, Suite for orchestra and harp solo, Op.65
MANUEL DE FALLA: El amor brujo (Vers.1925)
MANUEL DE FALLA: El sombrero de tres picos
Harp: Daniela Iolkicheva
Singer: Marina Heredia
Conductor: Lucas Macías
Program notes
Joaquín Turina dedicated a piano suite (‘Silueta nocturna’, ‘Evocación medieval’, ‘A plena luz’) to the castle of Almodóvar del Río, restored and opened to the public in 1930. Premiered in 1931, today we are offered the orchestral version with harp that the composer prepared in 1933.
It is followed by two essential works of Spanish music: El amor brujo and El sombrero de tres picos, by Manuel de Falla, in which the Cadiz-born composer demonstrates his great knowledge of popular music.
El amor brujo was first performed in 1915 as a ‘gitanería in one act and two scenes’, with a plot by the Martínez Sierra couple. After some revisions, and with a different organisation of the numbers, Falla turned it into a ballet in 1925. The work presents a singular love triangle (the spectre of a former lover comes between Candela and Carmelo) and takes place in a world of magic and superstition until, the ghost conjured by ancestral rites, Candela regains her freedom in love.
Orchestral brilliance and elaborate popular motifs are found in El sombrero de tres picos, based on a novel by Pedro Antonio de Alarcón, which tells the story of an old corregidor's attraction to a beautiful married miller. The farce El corregidor y la molinera was first performed in Madrid in 1917 and Diaghilev encouraged Falla to turn it into a ballet, which had great international repercussions after its premiere in London in 1919 by the Ballets Russes, with sets and costumes by Picasso.
Juan Lamillar