ALBÉNIZ'S LEYENDA (Preludio-Asturias) by Stanley Yates

Transcription

1 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) ALBÉNIZ' LEYENDA (Preludio-Asturias) by tanley Yates by tanley Yates All Rights Reserved Extracts of music and text reroduced with ermission of Mel Bay Publications Inc Background to the Piece The Programmatic Asect The Original Pubication Arrangements for Guitar 5 The Elements of egovia's Arrangement 6 A New Arrangement 7 uggestions for Performance 8 In Conclusion 9 Resources Background to the Piece Albeniz's relude, Asturias-Leyenda, is erhas the quintessential "anish guitar" iece A favorite of Andrés egovia, and virtually every guitarist that followed him, the iece has become so widely identified with the guitar that those who do not know otherwise would robably be astonished to discover that the work was originally written for the iano Isaac Albeniz (86-99) wrote the iece during the early 89's, most likely in London (where he had established himself as a concert ianist and theatre comoser) The iece was first ublished in Barcelona, by Juan Bta Puol & Co, in 89 as the oening Preludio of a threemovement set entitled Chants d' Esagne, O Five years later, both Juan Bta Puol and the nion Musical Esañola in Madrid ublished a five-movement version of the work, again with our iece as the oening Preludio even years after this, in 9 (two years after Albéniz's death), the German ublisher Hofmeister ublished the first comlete version of an earlier work of Albéniz's, the uite esañola, O 7 This work had been advertised in 886 as an eight-movement suite, but only four of its movements had actually been ublished The four movements added to comlete the set, however, had all been ublished reviously under different titles It aears that the ublisher simly took existing works of Albéniz's and inserted them into the uite esañola, changing the names to fit those originally advertised 5 years earlier! (Perhas Albéniz, in characteristic style, had romised his early ublisher more works than he cared to deliver) Thus our iece, Preludio became known as Asturias (subtitled Leyenda), the originally advertised fifth movement of Albéniz's uite esañola Does all this really matter? I believe it does, since the title of a iece tells us something of its intended character The titles of the movements advertised for Albéniz's earlier uite

2 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) esañola draw uon a wide range of anish rovinces: Aragon, Andalucia, Castile, Catalonia, as well as the Northern mining region, Asturias The Chants d' Esagne, the collection in which our iece was originally ublished, however, is insired entirely by the Andalucia region - the home of flamenco, and of the Moorish invasion We need only comare the image of the Asturian bagie (the characteristic folk instrument of that region) with the Andalucian guitar to realize that Albéniz's insiration for the Preludio was not Asturias By what name should we refer to the iece then? Clearly, the misleading Asturias is out of the question Albéniz's original title Preludio does not misreresent the character of the iece, but says little about its identity and character The ublisher's subtitle Leyenda, on the other hand, is a quite evocative and identifiable title Although erhas not sulied by Albéniz himself, with clarity in mind, Leyenda ( Legend ) does aear a good comromise The Programmatic Asect Albéniz's Leyenda, a most evocative iece of music, has insired numerous dramatic stories, from biblical thunderstorms to devastating earthquakes, which were often found as adornments to the backs of old record covers However, Albéniz's nostalgia for his homeland was exressed in much more romantic, and much more inventive, terms than these Imagining himself of Moorish ancestry, most of Albéniz's own comments concerning the rogrammatic asect of his music derive from images of the Alhambra the elaborate Moorish alace-fortress that overlooks the Andalucian city of Granada Of this lace (which he visited on several occasions), Albéniz imagined evening serenades and uergas (all-night gysy flamenco arties), accomanied on the one hand by the strumming of guitars and on the other by the "lazy dragging of the fingers across the strings" of the guzla, an ancient Arabic instrument (a single examle of which Albéniz surely never saw, let alone actually heard) eaking in 886 of his serenata, Granada, Albéniz wrote: I live and write a erenatasad to the oint of desair, among the aroma of the flowers, the shade of the cyresses, and the snow of the ierra I will not comose the intoxication of auerga I seek now the traditionthe guzla, the lazy dragging of the fingers over the strings And above all, a heartbreaking lament out of tunei want the Arabic Granada, that which is art, which is all that seems to me beauty and emotion Albéniz's owers of musical descrition and romantic invention extended well beyond the realities of his life and his actual exeriences (even roducing a very colourful autobiograhical account of a young life that, in reality, was quite uneventful) Albéniz could hardly have visited From a letter written by Albéniz to his friend Enrique Moragas in 886 Cited in Walter Clark, Albéniz: Portrait of a Romantic (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 998), 65, fn The colorful stories of Albeniz's youth - his being denied entry to the Paris conservatory at age six after throwing a ball through a ane of glass, concert tours as a runaway from age eight, stowing away to the New World aboard a steamshi, studies with Franz Liszt, etc, are legendary, but fictitious Albéniz aears to have invented the whole story on the sot after a successful concert in Madrid in 886, reinventing his biograhy for inclusion in Giusee Arteaga y Pereira's Celebridades musicales, which was ublished in Barcelona later that year Incredibly, virtually all subsequent biograhies of Albéniz aear to derive from this source ee the reface to my Isaac Albéniz: Pieces Arranged for the Guitar (Pacific: Mel Bay Publications, 999), 8-

3 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) for himself the "tower" that insired the title of one of his best-known iano works, Torre bermea If he had, he would hardly have been insired to cature the exerience in music An amusing descrition of the Torre bermea is rovided by American author James Michener, who visited the "Vermillion Tower" on the strength of having heard Albéniz's iano work Fully execting to find a "slendid Moorish monument" he instead found "a air of square, dumy thingsa squat tower built of ugly brick in the worst ossible roortions, as far removed in sirit from the music of Albéniz as one could imagine" No doubt, Albéniz too had been cativated by the evocative words, "Torre bermea," which was enough to insire him to the comosition of a iece of music that described something deriving only from his owerful romantic imagination o what was the insiration behind Albéniz's reludio, Leyenda? Living outside ain (most of his ieces in "anish" style were written in London and Paris), Albéniz felt a nostalgia for his homeland which evoked images of flamenco, and of the ancient, Moorish quality of Andalucia even though Albéniz was a Catalan, he identified his "anishness" with Andalucia and even imagined that he was of Moorish ancestry (aarently an unfounded notion) Albéniz's music also resonds to the religious collision between the Moors and Christians in ain, insired by the uxtaosed architecture of those surviving, awe-insiring mosques of Granada, evilla and Cordoba, which later became catholic cathedrals All of these elements are to be found in our iece The oening section of the work could hardly be more evocative of the flamenco guitar, with its "oen-string" edal oint and "rasgueado" chords (figure ): The slow central section is more sohisticated The oening hrases evoke the cante ondo, the imrovised solo song of that ersecuted Indian-Jewish-Gysy cultural amalgam that roduced what we today call flamenco (figure ): James Michener, Iberia: anish Travel Imressions and Reflections (New York: Random House, 968), 95-7

4 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) This eventually gives way to a more rhythmic, dance-like section with more active "guitar accomaniment" (figure ): Aesthetically, the coda is the most sohisticated art of the comosition As with his Cordoba (a iece from the same cycle, insired by another city famous for its mosque-cathedral), Albéniz introduces a series of ure diatonic choral-style harmonies, evoking the music of the Christian church, and reflecting the imosition of that religion on the ancient Moorish architecture (figure 5a): Albéniz does not view this as a conquest, however, and following a tentative reference to the main flamenco theme of the iece there aears a harmonically remarkable assage: an imressionistic blur of suerimosed tonic ("Christian") and Phyrigian augmented-sixth ("Muslim") harmonies The work ends on bare octaves (neither reconciliation nor conquest here) (figure 5b):

5 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age 5) The Original Publication Before discussing guitar arrangements of the iece, we should take a brief look at the first ublished version for iano (which differs, in a coule of interesting ways, from later ublished versions) Although no manuscrit version of the iece is known to exist, I have been able to locate a coy of the first edition (which actually contains the signature and ex-libris stam of no less a figure than Ricardo Viñes, the virtuoso ianist and ersonal friend of Albéniz): As already mentioned, this first edition of the three-movement version of the Chants d' Esagne, (Preludio-Orientale-ous le Palmier) was ublished in Barcelona in 89 by one of Albéniz's main ublishers of the time, Juan Bta Puol & Co, with the late number P C These movements aear in identical form in the five-movement versions of the Chants d' Esagne ublished by Juan Bta Puol and nion Musical Esañola in Madrid in 897 Indeed, the engraving was made from the same lates Turning to the version of the iece that aeared as "Asturias-leyenda" after Albéniz's death, in the first edition of the "comlete" uite esañola, ublished in Leizig in 9 by Friedrich Hofmeister, we find a slightly different version of the iece Interestingly, nion Musical Esañola, who also ublished a "comlete" version of the uite esañola in 98, edited by Juan alvat, re-engraved the iece but clearly based it on the earlier version rather than the "revised" Hofmeister version All subsequent editions of the iece to the resent day, however, aear to be derived from the slightly altered Hofmeister edition We can therefore establish that two basic versions of the iece exist: the original version ublished as Preludio in the early versions of the Chants d' Esagne (89 and 897); the version that aeared as Asturias-Leyenda in the 98 nion Musical Esañola edition of the uite esañola

6 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age 6) the revised version ublished as Asturias-Leyenda by Hofmeister in 9 in the first comlete edition of the uite esañola (uon which subsequent editions of the iece aear to have been based, for examle the widely distributed version edited by Isador Philli, first ublished in 95 by International Music) The essential differences between the two early versions of the iece are few, but significant The original temo marking "Allegro ma non troo" in the later version became "Allegro" with an attached metronome marking of quarter-note = The unmarked central section of the original version is marked "Più Lento" in the later versions with a metronome marking of quarter = 8 There are also differences of dynamic and exression markings The dynamic range of the main section of the iece in the earlier version fff is moderated in the later version to ff The central section has less detail of exression markings in the later version, therefore aearing less exressive, esecially in the matter of rhythmic flexibility Perhas the most interesting difference, though subtle, concerns the addition of an accidental to several hrases in the melodic cante ondo section of the iece (figure 6): The later editions added a natural sign to the grace-note c-natural, removing the evocative augmented-second interval Albéniz used this "forbidden" melodic interval to evoke the Moorish quality of the cante ondo in several other ieces, including Granada, "a lament out of tune" (see the quotation above) That c is indeed the itch intended by Albéniz is verified by the fact that in all other instances of this grace-note figure in the iece, Albéniz used the customary shorthand sign (see figure, above) Only in the secial case of those figures that use the augmentedsecond did he take the trouble to write out the notes in full

7 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age 7) Arrangements for Guitar everal items of the Albéniz's iano reertory were arranged for guitar during the comoser's lifetime The first guitarist to do so was robably Francisco Tárrega (85-99), a fellow Catalan and an almost exact contemorary of Albéniz Tárrega's most illustrious student Miguel Llobet also made guitar arrangements of Albéniz's iano music, aarently with the blessing of the comoser, since Llobet erformed Albéniz's Granada in a concert arranged by Albéniz himself in Barcelona in 96 The first successful guitar arrangement of the reludio Leyenda, however, no doubt belongs to Andrés egovia, though he wasn't the first guitarist to erform or arrange the iece That distinction should robably go to the rolific arranger everino García Fortea In his autobiograhy of the years 89-9, egovia mentions that he was "transcribing Leyenda by Albéniz, which hereto had been layed from the transcrition made by that hack[!], Don everino Garcia" 5 Although I have not been able to determine when egovia first began to include the iece in his recital rograms, we do know that he rogrammed the iece for a recital in Graz, Austria in October, 9 6 Although the rogram is lost, it is quite ossible that egovia also rogrammed the iece for his milestone debut in Paris, earlier that year egovia did not record his arrangement until much later, however, in 95 (it aears on An Andres egovia Recital on the Brunswick label, AXTL 5), and he did not ublish it until three years after that, in 956 (with Ricordi American in Buenos Aires) From this oint on, a steady stream of guitar arrangements of Leyenda began to aear on the market, the maority tacitly taking egovia's edition as their rimary source 5 The Elements of egovia's Arrangement Albéniz's iano original cannot be layed on the guitar unedited; the original key of g-minor is unsuitable, many octave doublings and chord voicings cannot be reroduced, the original registration of the iece extends beyond the tessitura of the guitar, and the dynamic range (a long, continuous crescendo from to fff, for examle) cannot be realized literally In addressing these issues, egovia introduced a number of distinguishing features into his arrangement of the iece: He added guitaristic trilet figuration in the outer Allegro sections (figure 7): ee the reface to my Isaac Albéniz: Pieces Arranged for the Guitar, o cit, 7 5 Andrés egovia, egovia: An Autobiograhy of the Years 89-9 (New York: Macmillan Publishers, 76), 8 6 The rogram is included in Graham Wade and Gerard Garno, A New Look at egovia: His Life and his Music (Pacific: Mel Bay Publications, 997), 5

8 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age 8) (He also dearted from the constant staccato articulation of the original by adding sustained bass notes, as can be seen above) He also introduced trilet figuration in a assage at the end of the slow central section that refers to the texture of the oening Allegro section (inadvertently disguising the relationshi between the two sections?) (figure 8): And he again used trilet figuration at the end of the iece, where the original resents an imressionistic blur of suerimosed tonic and augmented-sixth harmonies (the original is again set in the rhythm and texture of the oening Allegro section) (figure 9):

9 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age 9) The Allegro sections end with a "guitaristic" flourish which, while erfectly reasonable on the iano, cannot be reroduced literally on the guitar egovia substituted izzicato eighthnotes and a concluding chord (figure ): At one oint in the Allegro sections it becomes imossible to retain both the uer and lower notes of an evocative Phrygian augmented-sixth chord egovia substituted the following chord, which reserves the correct uer tone, but alters the bass-note (figure ): 6 A New Arrangement In rearing my edition, Isaac Albéniz: 6 Pieces Arranged for the Guitar for my series with Mel Bay Publications, I was faced with the inevitable: I would have to include an arrangement of Leyenda Following the criteria that I had established for the rest of the edition, working from the very first edition of the iece and intent on resisting the weight of tradition, this resulted in quite some differences between my version and the one reviously established by egovia Here are some of the issues I addressed in the arrangement As already mentioned, the outer Allegro sections of this iece evoke the flamenco guitar, secifically the technique of laying a lower-voice melody with the thumb underneath a reeated uer oen-string edal, unctuated (later in the section) with emhatic "rasgueado" chords To my ear, the interest in such assages lies in the momentary "collision" and crossing of the arts I therefore chose a fingering that lays with the timbral differences between the reeated-note oen-string edal and the fretted melody beneath (rather than lacing this melody on the fourth and fifth strings, as do traditional guitar arrangements of the iece) (figure ):

10 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) I also maintained the staccato articulation of lower voice and rasgueado chords throughout the Allegro sections uch chords as the following are damed by the left-hand immediately after strumming (figure ): Albéniz's original kees to sixteenth-note rhythm throughout the Allegro section The effect is one of a gradually accumulating insistency as the oening melodic motive is reeated over and over again, suorted by the relentless, unchanging rhythm of the uer edal (In other words, I felt no need to incororate egovia s trilet figuration) Although the lower-voice melody remains essentially constant throughout the entire section, the uer reeated-note edal does change, as does the bass-art during the "rasgueado" section It is not ossible to remain faithful to both arts on the guitar, as can be seen in the following figure (figure ): I have always been bothered by the re-voiced augmented-sixth chord in traditional guitar arrangements of this iece, feeling the chromatically-altered bass A to be the most imortant note (it is this note that defines the inversional quality of the harmony, and which rovides very strong chromatic voice-leading in the lower voice) Wishing to retain the effect of an idiomatic oen-string edal and the chromatic movement of the bass, and to at least suggest the movement C-B of the original uer reeated-note edal oint, I decided uon the following solution (figure 5):

11 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) For those unfamiliar with the iano version, it may to take some getting used to, but it does sound quite authentic (even though the uer notes are not those of the original) I adoted the following figuration for the final flourish of this section (again, although it sounds quite like the original, the note-content has been translated to the idiom of the guitar) (figure 6): The evocative central section of the iece requires many subtle adustments in order for it to work idiomatically on the guitar I mention some of the more significant ones here Like many modern layers, I am very fond of lassicare vibrare (overlaing, har-like) effects on the guitar, and of "cross-string" ornaments I therefore decided to introduce these effects to highlight the evocative, ancient Moorish quality of the cante ondo sections of the iece (I also included a more traditional realization, as an aendix) (figure 7): I also considered the character of the original dynamic markings, which resulted in further evocative fingerings, such as the following (figure 7a):

12 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) I tried to maintain the relationshi between the texture of the oening Allegro and references made to it in the central and closing sections of the iece (figure 8): Like egovia, I found no elegant way to reroduce the voicing of the dance-like ortion of the central section, beyond retaining the rhythm and articulation of the original (with re-voiced chords) (see figures, 8 and 8, above) Finally, I recreated the imressionistic blur of the ending as follows (figure 9): 7 uggestions for Performance I would like to offer a few suggestions concerning the erformance of Albéniz's Leyenda An essential ingredient in caturing the character of any iece of music is the chosen temo One "notch" either side can have quite dramatic effect This iece is not a virtuosic toccata, but a nostalgic evocation of Moorish Granada Bearing in mind the original temo indication of Allegro ma non troo, I would suggest a temo of around quarter-note = 6- If you refer to take the "revised" temo of Allegro, then I would suggest a temo of around quarter-note = 6- (with or without trilet figuration) An imortant asect of the Allegro sections is the sense of constant dynamic growth from to fff (over measures!) To roect this in erformance, I use the following strategy:

13 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) -6 tasto 7- normal - crescendo mf crescendo, brighter sound 5- f crescendo, hard bright sound - ff very hard, bright sound 5-7 f normal sound 8 diminuendo 9 (I start the da cao at m almost imercetibly soft, murmuring (the iece, not me), which allows for an even wider dynamic range the second time through) Within these broad dynamics, the oening motive can also be subtly shaed, as follows (figure ): When laying the rasgueado chords (strummed quickly with ami) try to make sure the lower notes are clearly heard, and be sure to dam the chord immediately by releasing the left-hand ressure (or with the third finger, for the e-minor chord in mm -5) (see figure, above) If you absolutely can't live without egovia's trilet figuration, simly ut it back in between mm 7-8 Finally, consider the various changes of character that occur throughout the iece: the solo flamenco guitar of the Allegro ma non troo the soulful, Moorish cante ondo vocal of mm6-78, unctuated by "guitar" chords the tentative, yet rhythmic dance-like character of the accomaniment from mm79- the references to the oening solo guitar Allegro ma non troo at mm- the return to the solo vocal line at mm8- the diatonic "Christian" chorale harmonies that aear at mm85-8 interruted at mm 89-9 the last "breath" of the "solo guitar" at mm9- the uxtaosition of Muslim and Christian cultures reresented by the imressionistic suerimosition of tonic and augmented-sixth chords at mm95-6 the non-resolute ending of the final tonic octaves (Try visualizing these characters during your erformance)

14 YATE Albéniz s Leyenda (age ) 8 In Conclusion Albéniz's Leyenda is a iece of music that has been given a second life How often would we hear the iece had it not been adoted by guitarists? The same can be said of much of the Albéniz iano reertoire; ianists themselves rarely get to it and it is in the hands of guitarists that the music survives today Because of this, we may regard this adoted reertoire as something of our own As such, and since we have taken so freely from Albéniz s music, we have a resonsibility to do our best with it, to search for its essential character, to resect it, and to exress it with all the means available to us The arranging rocess is not only one of transferring the notes of one instrument to another; it is also the rocess of comosing with redetermined materials, of recomosing, as though the original had been written guitar in hand as the musical idea was first exressed in sound If Albéniz sat down today with a guitar in his hands, and the Alhambra in his mind, what would he lay? The new arrangement described here is simly one answer to that question 9 Resources tanley Yates' Albéniz Edition and Reviews

15 Arranged for guitar by TANLEY YATE % Allegro ma non troo π fl i 5 marcato il canto A mon cher ami Louis E Puol Prélude Chants d'esagne, O, no (Asturias leyenda, uite esañola, O 7, no 5) [q = ] fl sim IAAC ALBÉNIZ (London, ca 89) fl 7 6 f π x (cross-fingering) 6 π (reare ) 5 *) see note π *) see age 6 for alternative realizations of this assage 999 Mel Bay Publications Inc Reroduced with Permission - 5 For Private se Only

16 Prélude (Chants d'esagne) Asturias, leyenda (uite esañola) 9 π 5 8 VII 6 ami f semre n - V 7 ƒ - semre f cresc cresc n 5 (dam with ) ƒ 999 Mel Bay Publications Inc Reroduced with Permission 6 For Private se Only

17 - 5 VII 6 Preludio (Chants d'esagne) Asturias, leyenda (uite esañola) V f n dim semre 6 5 (dim) π n 55 sim 58 6 i - i a VII i m i m XI oco rit 999 Mel Bay Publications Inc Reroduced with Permission 7 For Private se Only

18 Prélude (Chants d'esagne) Asturias, leyenda (uite esañola) art har 9th fi 6 u cantando largamente ma dolce - J m F VII 6 67 J m F III 6 *) see note - i a m lv J dim Ó F VII 6 F m IV b J lv i a m dim e molto ritard Ó 6 n 8 n - molto rit u III 5 a temo II 5 marcato 89 marcato dim e rall n molto moreno 9 n *) see age 6 for an alternative realization of this assage II 5 a temo I n F n 999 Mel Bay Publications Inc Reroduced with Permission 8 For Private se Only

19 II 5 - dim n n b m - dim m morendo rit n cresc a temo Preludio (Chants d'esagne) Asturias, leyenda (uite esañola) cresc dim π a temo a temo π fi quasi ont dolce 8 & J m i lento art har m molto rit rall sim F J th 6 lv 5 quasi andante π molto rall π 5 J sim n m I n rall b b morendo n D a rit arm th π u % 999 Mel Bay Publications Inc Reroduced with Permission 9 For Private se Only

20 Prélude (Chants d'esagne) Asturias, leyenda (uite esañola) ALTERNATIVE REALIZATION The following is a more traditional alternative to the cross-string ornaments and lv effects used in measures 7-78 (7) - (78) dim dim e molto ritard Ó - Ó VII 6 F IV Many guitar arrangements introduce trilets at measure 7, though Albéniz's original kees the same rhythm throughout (as does the version resented above) Those who may wish to use trilet figuration may use the follwowing models to do so: for mm 7- i m 5 π - for mm 5-8 (returning to normal notes in m 9) i m f semre The otion also remains to remove the octaves of the original between mm 7-, with or without triet figuration, as follows: i m (7) or simly: (7) 999 Mel Bay Publications Inc Reroduced with Permission For Private se Only