This expression, "You shall not pass!", is known worldwide (and I think I'm not exaggerating with this "worldwide") as the motto of the defenders of the Republican government during the Spanish Civil War. We Catalan people also identify these words as the beginning of a poem widely spread during the war; I remember seeing in some book of History the reproduction of a pamphlet with the four verses. The poem, however, was not written during the civil war; In fact, its author, Apel·les Mestres, died at 82 precisely on July 19, 1936. The day after Franco's coup, the day after the war began. This poem, entitled La cançó dels invadits (The song of the invaded), is part of a collection called Flors de sang (Flowers of blood), that Mestres wrote after the German invasion of Belgium in World War I. Some sources attribute the origin of the expression "You shall not pass!" [...]

 

My dearest all, this week I'm on holiday, as far as possible from any piece of technological junk. I'm thinking of you though, and today it's Wednesday, so I'm sending you this musical postcard from one of the places more Lied-inspiring ever.

 

Jacques Villon is a French painter who lived between 1875 and 1963. He belonged to a family of artists; His real name was Gaston Duchamp and the painters and sculptors Marcel Duchamp, Suzanne Duchamp and Raymond Duchamp-Villon were his brothers (curiously, Raymond also adopted Gaston's pseudonym). Jacques Villon began his career as an illustrator in several magazines; a few years later, he engaged himself into "serious" painting and cultivated different styles such as impressionism, cubism and futurism. His work is extensive, but I would say that he's not as well-known as his contemporaries Picasso, Chagall, Braque, Gris, Klee and Miró (perhaps some art expert could share his or her opinion about Villon).

 

September is here! Welcome back if you were on holiday during the last weeks. I wish you all a great Art Song season! A new season begins, but summer is still in the air, so I suggest a musical trip until the next city break comes. A few years ago, Wolf and Mörike took us to their island, Orplid, the first week of September and today, Britten and Auden will take us to theirs. Benjamin Britten and W. H. Auden first met in the summer of 1935, when the General Post Office Film Unit hired them to write music and text, respectively, to their documentaries. Cinema was the new mass media and both welcomed that opportunity to reach a wide audience. Auden was twenty-seven and had received recognition for his first volumes of poetry; Britten was twenty-one and had just left the Royal College of Music. His training was essentially musical and, for his inclinations, very [...]

 

My dearest all, August and the 2016-2017 season are both ending this week (and I hope many of you are still on holidays!). Other years, we arrived at this point with those posts dedicated to the Schubertíade Vilabertran, but this year it wasn't possible because of the festival's schedule. So, I had to think of something short and light (summer posts are supposed to be short and light) and I remembered a few things I ‘ve gathered and could share with you.