Composers of Spain

From the late 1800’s to early 1900’s there were three central composers in Spain: Isaac Albeniz, Enrique Granados, and Manuel de Falla. All three of these composers have certain similar elements that make their music very “Spanish” sounding, although all three wrote very different works. Some of the most prominent influences that are in their music are Moorish influence, which was from Northern Africa. This is what attributes to the gypsy like sound in the music. The Flamenco, which were songs and dances of Andalusia, also have a strong influence on their music. All three of these composers also studied under the same teacher, Felipe Pedrell, which could also account for many of their similarities.

Albeniz’s music tends to have a lot of heavy clusters and clashy chords. His music is full of accidentals. His music has four main elements: dance rhythms, cante hondo (songs with themes about love, sorrow, and death), exotic scales, and guitar idoms. These qualities can be heard in Triana. It begins with a staccato pattern that is repeated through out the rest of the piece, giving it a dance like quality. The melody is like the cante hondo, full of emotion, and composed of exotic scales. There are guitar like passages mixed in to give it the sound of strumming.

In Granados piece, La Maja Y el Ruisenor, there is much less drive to the music and a more lyrical presence. It is similar to a nocturne. He uses a lot of ornamentation in the music, although it is much more straight forward than Albenez’s music. The ornamentation and melody sounds very “spanish” with the moorish, gypsy-like, sound. The end of the piece, is much different from the rest, and is almost like an afterthought. It is supposed to sound like the nightengale, and is full of trills and flourishes of notes.

Falla’s work, Fantasia Baetica, begins much different from the other two pieces. It starts out with a very driving rhythm, and a pattern that sounds like hard strumming on a guitar. The middle of the work dies down, with more melodic material that is composed of the Moorish styles. There is a single line with a continued strumming in the accompaniment. This does not last long however, and the music picks pack up, with the glissando along with key board and many exotic scales.