Cançioneta
Federico Mompou (1893-1987)
Suite Compostelana
Cançion y Danza no. 6 & 10
Manuel de Falla (1876-1946)
Homenaje a Debussy
Vicente Asencio (1908-1979)
Suite Valenciana
Antonio José (1902-1936)
Sonata
Frederick Lawton (guitar)
rec. 2022, Holy Trinity, Weston, UK
Reviewed as download
Navona NV6723 [59]
Frederick Lawton began as an electric guitarist, and was studying jazz and pop at university when he decided to change direction and devote himself to the classical guitar. He has studied with several prominent teachers both abroad and on home ground. He seems to be an inquisitive musician, prepared to roam off the beaten track. For this album he has opted for Spanish music, but not Sor or other nineteenth century composers. Instead he has chosen four from the mid-20th century, covering the period 1920 to 1971.
The opening work is Suite Compostelana by Federico Mompou, and the background is interesting. It was composed for and dedicated to Andres Segovia who also premiered it in 1962. They had met the year before at a summer course in Santiago de Compostela, where they both taught. They were exact contemporaries: born in 1893 and died in 1987. It is also one of the utterly few guitar compositions by Mompou. The two Cançion y Danza, also included here, were originally written for piano, which was Mompou’s instrument, and only later transcribed for guitar by the composer. I was familiar with his piano works and his songs, which together occupy the majority of his oeuvre, but his guitar works were unknown to me. Like most of his piano works, they are mostly slow and inward, even melancholy. Lawton comments on this in his notes, saying that this is “reflecting life in the frequently grey and misty Northwestern corner of Spain.” Mompou’s characteristic stylistic features are very prominent also here: basically he is Impressionist, but he spices the music abundantly with dissonances. This is typical, whether we listen to his earliest or his latest works, so it seems that he found his métier very early and stuck to it. Another feature is his interest in folk music; either he quotes particular melodies or is clearly influenced by them. In this suite, Cançion (track 5) is a beautiful example. There is a kind of sameness throughout the suite, without it actually becoming longwinded. There are subtle contrasts, from the quite minimalistic Preludio to the concluding Muñeira which is the only up-tempo movement.
The general melancholy of Suite Compostelana also spills over to the two Cançion y Danza, insofar as the Cançion is very beautiful – I truly enjoyed them – while the first Danza has very little of dance feeling in it. But the second Danza gives ample compensation with a lively dance adventure.
Manuel de Falla’s contribution to this disc is a better-known quantity for guitar afficionados. Homenaje a Debussy was composed in 1920 as a tribute to Claude Debussy, who had died two years earlier. It was de Falla’s only work for guitar, and it is uncertain why he wrote it, besides the fact that he was a great admirer of Debussy and his importance as a pioneer of including influences from other cultures. He made transcriptions for other instruments as well, and when it was premiered in 1921, it was played in a version for harp, until Emilo Pujol eventually played it on the guitar at the Paris Conservatoire the next year. The work became a watershed in attitudes towards the guitar as a serious instrument when a world-famous composer “condescended “ to write something else than salon music for guitar. It takes a little more than three minutes to play but involved almost a revolution. Andres Segovia was one of the earliest to play Homenaje, and was to become a most active commissioner of guitar music from important composers such as Brazilian Heitor Villa-Lobos.
Vicente Ascensio belonged in the 1930s to a group of young musicians, whose aim was to “strive for the realization of a powerful and rich Valencian art music”. He remained loyal to this motto and forty years later, in 1971, he created his Suite Valenciana in three brief movements. The dramatic Preludio immediately grabs the listener with its intensity, and the Cançioneta is a beautiful evening song, but the high spot is without doubt the Dansa, a swirling flamenco, melodious and virtuoso – truly captivating: Olé!
Antonio José Martinez Palacios – as was his full name – showed exceptional musical talent at an early age, and he might very well have become one of the greatest Spanish composers of all times if he had been granted a longer life but it was cut short by execution in the Spanish Civil War in 1936. He wrote several large scale orchestral works; possibly the best is Sinfonia castellana from 1923, when he was only 21.
I first came across his guitar sonata some twenty years ago, and was immediately deeply fascinated by it. I wrote at the time: “It is a many-faceted composition. The first movement has a certain improvisatory character with sudden changes of mood. The short minuet seems to be searching for a tonal centre while the third movement Pavana triste makes some efforts to get rid of the melancholy but finally capitulates. The final movement, though, is filled with rhythms and unbending energy. A fascinating composition.” This verdict is still valid, and it was a pleasure to return to it after some years. I do have a couple of other recordings of the sonata, and now they get a worthy companion.
The whole programme gives a good picture of a side of the Spanish guitar repertoire other than the 19th century composers we most often encounter, and those unfamiliar with the four 20th century masters represented here are recommended to give this disc a listen. Frederick Lawton is an excellent guide.
An interesting “novelty” is also the recording. Lawton explains: “This album was recorded with ribbon microphones from the 1940s and classic microphones from the 1970s, with the intention of recreating some of the ambience of the classic recordings for the instrument. It has been blended with the latest technology to create a sound that traverses different generations of the guitar’s recording history.” It is an old-fashioned sound picture, warmer and more friendly. For someone who has grown up with the analogue sound it is a kind of home-coming. I am convinced that readers of my generation will feel the same.
Göran Forsling
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