Postcards from Spain - Thea Musgrave, composer

Photo: Christian Steiner

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Thea Musgrave
composer
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Postcards from Spain
(1995) For solo guitar
Duration: 7'
Five Serenades for Guitar
Commissioned by Sam Dorsey and the Tidewater Classical Guitar Society

World Premiere: 10 May 1996, Norfolk, Virginia
Michael Lorimer, guitar

Publisher: Novello & Co Ltd

Critical Acclaim:

Musgrave's work highlights a gentler and more lyrical aspect of her craft than the dramatic and stormy subjects of her historical operas. The five short 'postcards' make up a descriptive travelogue of Spain without being overly pictorial or self-consciously Spanish. The vocabulary and color of Spanish music is used sparingly, but effectively. Particularly memorable are the stillness and poetry Musgrave finds in the second movement Starlight on Compostela and the drama of the final section, depicting Don Quixote and his windmills. Other sections portray a flamenco singer, the Alhambra, and a troubadour.
Paul Saygeh, The Virginia Pilot

Program note by Michael Lorimer:

1. Cantaor (Triana)
In a cafe in Triana, the section of Seville famous for its flamenco culture, a "cantaor" (flamenco singer) and his guitar sit erectly. "Strum-a-strum!" goes the guitarrista; the singer begins his tale; "strum!" interrupts; and then on continues the song.

2. Starlight over Compostela (Santiago de Compostela)
The starry sky, recalled here by the clear timbres of harmonics, illustrates the enormous baroque cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, a city that exists simply because of its faith in a miracle. Legend says that St James' body, after having been beheaded by Herod, was wondrously transported in seven days by his disciples to northern Spain, where it lay forgotten for hundreds of years. In 813, a shepherd guided by the light of a star discovered the remains on the site over which the cathedral was erected during the 11,12 and 13th centuries, in which the relics of St James are entombed, and to which hundreds of millions have made pilgrimage from the middle ages until today.

3. Trovador (Segovia)
In the foreground we see a provincial poet in medieval dress, a troubadour who accompanies himself on a medieval guitar and sings the song we hear in this movement's "cantabile" middle section, a tale of knights in shining armor and of battles in the land of castles (Castilla). In the background, over the trovador's shoulder, we glimpse the soaring towers of Spain's most famous castle, the Alcazar of Segovia, here evoked by the sound of distant trumpets (a "llamada") in the chords percussively played in this serenade's improvisatory beginning and ending.

4.
Reflecting Pools of the Alhambra (Granada)
The tranquility and beauty of this water are evoked here by the slow melody of sustained notes played by the guitar's bass and alto registers over which accompanying chords undulate.

5. Windmills (Consuegra)
Here in the bone dry tableland of La Mancha, behind the town of Consuegra, the center of the production of saffron, we see perched like sentinels on the crest of a dramatic stony hill, ten shimmering white windmills. In the hurried, breathless, nonstop figurations of this "moto perpetuo", we can imagine the windmills spinning and transforming themselves in the mind of Don Quixote into enormous giants against which he tilted with his rusty lance.

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1.		Cantaor (Triana) In a cafe in Triana, the section of Seville famous for its flamenco culture, a "cantaor" (flamenco singer) and his guitar sit erectly. "Strum-a-strum!" goes the guitarrista; the singer begins his tale; "strum!" interrupts; and then on continues the song.
2.		Starlight over Compostela (Santiago de Compostela) The starry sky, recalled here by the clear timbres of harmonics, illustrates the enormous baroque cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, a city that exists simply because of its faith in a miracle. Legend says that St James' body, after having been beheaded by Herod, was wondrously transported in seven days by his disciples to northern Spain, where it lay forgotten for hundreds of years. In 813, a shepherd guided by the light of a star discovered the remains on the site over which the cathedral was erected during the 11,12 and 13th centuries, in which the relics of St James are entombed, and to which hundreds of millions have made pilgrimage from the middle ages until today.
3.		Trovador (Segovia) In the foreground we see a provincial poet in medieval dress, a troubadour who accompanies himself on a medieval guitar and sings the song we hear in this movement's "cantabile" middle section, a tale of knights in shining armor and of battles in the land of castles (Castilla). In the background, over the trovador's shoulder, we glimpse the soaring towers of Spain's most famous castle, the Alcazar of Segovia, here evoked by the sound of distant trumpets (a "llamada") in the chords percussively played in this serenade's improvisatory beginning and ending.
4.		Reflecting Pools of the Alhambra (Granada) The tranquility and beauty of this water are evoked here by the slow melody of sustained notes played by the guitar's bass and alto registers over which accompanying chords undulate.
5.		Windmills (Consuegra) Here in the bone dry tableland of La Mancha, behind the town of Consuegra, the center of the production of saffron, we see perched like sentinels on the crest of a dramatic stony hill, ten shimmering white windmills. In the hurried, breathless, nonstop figurations of this "moto perpetuo", we can imagine the windmills spinning and transforming themselves in the mind of Don Quixote into enormous giants against which he tilted with his rusty lance.