Enrique Granados was born on 27th July 1867 in Lérida, near Barcelona.
Son of an army captain, he began his study of the piano in 1879 and the
following year he continued with Joan Baptista Pujol (1835-1898) at the
Academia Pujol. Three years later he performed Schumann’s Sonata, Op.
22, in an academy-sponsored competition, for which one of the jury
members was the noted composer Felipe Pedrell (1841-1922). The
sixteen-year-old Granados won the competition and obviously impressed
Pedrell, who began giving him instruction in harmony and composition in
1884.
In 1887 Granados went to Paris, where he studied the piano
with Charles-Wilfrid de Bériot (1833-1914). Granados was highly
influenced by the latter’s insistence on tone-production and pedal
technique. In addition, Bériot emphasized improvisation in his teaching,
reinforcing Granados’ natural ability in the skill. After returning to
Barcelona in 1889, Granados published his Danzas españolas, which
brought him international recognition.
In his lifetime Granados
appeared in concerts in Spain, France and the United States,
collaborating with conductors such as Isaac Albéniz and Pablo Casals,
the violinists Eugène Ysaÿe and Jacques Thibaud, pianists Mieczyslaw
Horszowski and Camille Saint-Saëns. In addition to his numerous piano
works he composed chamber music, vocal music, operas, and symphonic
poems. Granados was also a fine teacher and in 1901 he founded the
Academia Granados, which produced such noted musicians as Paquita
Madriguera, Conchita Badia and Frank Marshall.
In 1912 Granados
met the American pianist Ernest Schelling, who was the first pianist to
perform the music of Granados outside Spain. Schelling arranged for
Granados’ works to be published in New York and encouraged Granados in
his plans to convert the piano suite Goyescas into an opera, later
arranging for its première at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.
Terrified
of the ocean, Granados nevertheless sailed to New York for the première
of the opera on 28th January 1916. While in the United States he
performed numerous concerts, made piano-roll recordings, and also
performed at the White House in Washington. With his wife he set sail
for Europe via England, but while crossing the English Channel on the
British ship Sussex, their boat was torpedoed by a German submarine and
they both perished.
In about 1912 Granados wrote: "My motto has
always been to renounce an easy success in order to achieve one that is
true and lasting." Today he is universally recognised as one of Spain’s
most important composers. His music is multi-faceted, although it is
essentially romantic with some nationalist characteristics. He has been
variously described as "the Spanish Chopin", "the last Romantic", and by
his compatriots as "our Schubert". No single characterisation
adequately describes his personality. Granados had a distinctive voice
that is instantly recognisable and entirely his own.
Granados was
primarily influenced by mid-nineteenth century European Romanticism,
especially the music of Schumann and Chopin. The introverted luxuriance
of his luminous harmonies, his rich palette of pianistic colour, loose
formal structures and his vivid imagination, always tinged with
nostalgia, place him firmly within the Romantic School. It has
frequently been remarked that larger forms, such as those of sonatas and
concertos, did not attract him. His artistic personality was better
suited to shorter, rhapsodic forms, especially those based on
variations.
Piezas sobre cantos populares españolas were composed
about 1895 and dedicated to Cecilia Gómez de Conde, daughter-in-law of
Granados’ patron, Eduardo Conde. The collection is clearly nationalistic
in inspiration, written with a breadth of conception, romantic
brilliance, and technical complexity which make it comparable to his
Quinteto, Op. 49 and Trio, Op. 50, first performed the same year. No
manuscript of the set is known to exist, but Granados made a piano-roll
recording of Preludio for the Duo-Art Reproducing Piano in New York in
1916, which was issued under the title Prelude, María del Carmen.
The
original version of the suite Elisenda, first performed on 7th July,
1912, included four movements scored for chamber orchestra, piano, harp
and soprano. Later Granados made an arrangement for piano of the first
movement of the suite, El jardí d’Elisenda. The work was dedicated to
Pablo and Guillermina Casals, the cellist and his sister. The author of
the text used in the fourth movement of the suite was the Catalan poet
Apeles Mestres, one of the leading representatives of the cultural
movement Modernismo, parallel to Art Nouveau. Apeles Mestres was also
the librettist for four of Granados’ operas as well as the symphonic
poem Liliana. The first edition of the piano version of El jardí
d’Elisenda included a section of the Apeles Mestres poem of the same
title:
The rising sun wakes Elisenda’s garden
which dreams as it rests in the shade of the palace;
rosebushes flower, drops of water sing as they leap
out of the fountain.
To calm her sorrows and soften her longing
Elisenda has come down to the silent garden;
her heart far, far away, on the battlefields where
they are fighting and dying. . .
The flowers perfume her as they open their petals;
the fountain adds sweet music;
and the day is beginning. . .and Elisenda’s world
is turning into perfume, harmony and light. . .
And behold, as if by magic, hope rises up
in her heart.
The
manuscript of Parranda-Murcia is undated. Granados and his librettist
José Feliu y Codina spent several weeks, however, about 1895-1896 in the
province of Murcia gathering material for their opera María del Carmen.
Parranda-Murcia may have been written at that time. This is the first
recording of Parranda-Murcia and Pastoral, an atmospheric work first
published in the Spanish magazine Mundial Musical around 1910.
There
are two known manuscripts of Danza característica which are both
undated and untitled. The first edition of Danza característica,
published in 1973, gave the piece the present title. Granados may have
originally conceived of Danza característica as one of the Danzas
españolas, although it was not included in the final version of that
collection.
Sardana, published in 1914, is Granados’ only piano
work directly inspired by popular Catalan culture. It is dedicated to
the American pianist, conductor and composer, Ernest Schelling. The
sardana is a two-part group dance, typical of Granados’ native
Catalonia, in which the dancers form rings. The steps, curts (shorts)
and llarchs (longs), shape the music. Granados’ Sardana belongs to the
genre of concert sardanas, not intended for dancing.
Granados
composed Serenata as a gift to his wife. The manuscript is written on a
parchment dated 20th May, 1893, and was inscribed by the composer: ‘For
the Album of my life-companion, Amparo, so beloved and good - Your
husband’. It is unlikely that Granados intended Serenata for publication
or performance outside the family home.
Jácara, subtitled Danza
para cantar y bailar, may have been written as a study for the suite
Goyescas (Naxos 8.554403), since some of the melodic material was later
used in the sixth piece of the suite, Epílogo: Serenata del espectro.
Países
soñados appears to have been originally conceived as a collection of
pieces. Granados, however, composed only El palacio encantado en el mar
around 1912-1913. The work is subtitled Leyenda (Legend).
Impromptu
No. 1 and Impromptu de la codorniz, No. 2, were published in 1912, but
their date of composition is uncertain, as is that of Impromptu No. 3,
published in 1914 as Op. 39. Curiously, Capricho español, (Naxos
8.554628) was also published as Op. 39 around 1890. The three Impromptus
could not be more varied as a group. Impromptu No. 1 is probably
similar to one of Granados’ highly praised improvisations, Impromptu de
la codorniz, No. 2, is a bucolic pastoral, and Impromptu No. 3 radiates
Romantic fervour.
Douglas Riva
This performance follows
the critical edition of the Complete Works for Piano of Enrique
Granados, published by Editorial Boileau, S.A., Barcelona, Spain, Alicia
de Larrocha, Director and Douglas Riva, Assistant Director.
Enrique Granados (1867-1916)
1-7 6 Piezas sobre cantos populares espanoles
8 El jardi d'Elisenda
9 Parranda-Murcia
10 6 estudios expresívos en forma de piezas faciles: Pastoral
11 Danza característica
12 Sardana
13 Serenata
14 Paises soñados, Palacio encantado en el mar (Dream Lands, The Enchanted Palace in the Sea
15-18 3 Impromptus, Op. 39
Douglas Riva - Piano
