7 November 2000

My concert at St. Philips was very successful. The program was a challenge for me because it was new, and a challenge for the audience because it was very deep music

We estimate an attendance of about 190 people. Thanks for all that attended

And the audience was excellent. We had moments of pure silence – much like the clairmont crest concert – and there seemed to be a spiritual connection. I am very pleased that many of the people present liked my new transcriptions (canciones y danzas).

The program was as follows:

Suite Compostelana
Canciones y Danzas Nos. 4, 8, 10, 7, 6, 5

Here are the program notes:

Born in Barcelona in 1893. Federico Mompou studied piano with Pedro Serra at the Barcelona Conservatory until 1911. A recital by Gabriel Fauré and Marguérite Long during the 1909-10 season influenced him deeply and he decided then and there to become a composer, to go to Paris to study.

            From 1920 – 1941 he lived in Paris and became acquainted with the works of Satie and Ravel. As his own works began to be performed he became known by Paris high society. In 1941 he returned to Barcelona to lead a solitary life, dedicated to composing. He apparently needed the isolation of Barcelona rather than the high society of Paris to dream and experience his musical sensations.

            Mompou’s music is introspective, personal, sensuous, sometimes song-like, sometimes dance-like, with a popular folk quality. Often tinged with sadness, the music is dreamy and impressionistic, but always melodic and colorful – exquisite miniatures.

A first glance at his scores shows note patterns that look familiar and effortlessly playable from a technical point of view. There is practically nothing of virtuoso, ornamental or difficult nature, none of modern music's usual features like complex rhythmic balance, frequent time changes, extreme registers, excessive dynamics, bewildering accumulations of sharps and flats or huge interval leaps. 

He speaks of his craftsmanship: “I have always tried to create perfect works, where all of the measures are of the same quality. I’m convinced that the form I carry within me is like a power or destiny I can’t get rid and that simultaneously results in being the power of my music and one of its maxims. I used to work at the piano. But lately I try singing or imagining the developing of a melodic line…I can develop a theme without thinking much about it…It seems as if my music were my hands, hands which try at the keyboard until they get the group of keys to be depressed. Sometimes this trying leads to musical flow.”

Mompou died on the last day of June 1987.

 Suite Compostelana, written in 1962, is dedicated to Andres Segovia but pays homage to Spain’s holy city and pilgrimage center, Santiago de Compostela (which might be rendered into English as “Saint James of the Field of the Star”) where James, the Apostle, is believed to be buried. Segovia and other international musicians gathered to conduct a summer school in Santiago, incidentally. 

The Canciones y Danzas for piano (Nos. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 10 transcribed for guitar by Peter Fletcher) are among Mompou’s most beloved, if least representative, works. Their popularity and singularity lie in the composer’s use of traditional Catalan themes which he envelopes in his own harmonic language. There are exceptions; Nos. 5 and 6 are entirely original, although their melodies are now as “authentic” as, say, Copland’s evocations of the American West. The form – a lyric piece followed by a rhythmically related counterpart – is not Mompou’s invention; he was delighted to give credit to his mentors, from Liszt (the Rapsodies) to Allende (Tonadas chilenas).