The Naxos series devoted
to Catalan, Manuel Blancafort, a contemporary
of the equally long-lived Mompou, continues
with a second volume that again mines
his seam of youthful pianistic melancholia.
There are, it’s true, some parallels
with Mompou, though Blancafort lacks
the better-known Catalan’s exploration
of Satie-esque hypnotism, counterpoint
(late adopted) and a spiritual realm
that embraced stillness and the mystical.
Both however certainly owed much to
impressionism and to Ravel in particular
and this gives Blancafort’s music a
sense of tension though never mocking
romanticism.
The Six Short Pieces
fuse nature painting with impressionistic
devices and have a songful lyricism
that impresses. The elusive apartness
of the last of them in particular, Peace
at twilight, gives us a graphic
example of Debussian influence. There
are six Country Games and Dances and
these equally compressed pieces, most
around the two-minute mark in length,
evoke sensibilities, feelings and gentle
movement, though for all the rocking
subtlety of Poc a poc (Little
by little) and the affectionately drawn
Reposat (Tranquillo) they tend
to lack an individual stamp. More impressive
is the set of Intimate Songs I where
tristesse (I went to the beach to
relax and the sky was grey…runs
the superscription of one of them) and
flurries of tears (Llàgrimes)
fuse throughout the eight settings with
colour, rhythmic quirks (try Nothing
can console me) and a certain deliberate,
antique gravity (I have forgiven
you). There’s plenty of variety
and mood setting here and real textual
and technical command. The Eight Pieces,
from 1920-21, are descriptive and attractive;
the wind scurries of the first (with
excellent chordal depth from pianist
Miquel Villalba) is intriguingly voiced
and the stirring hymnal concentration
of the second, Església endolada)
is strong in expression and a degree
of noble resignation.
Jonathan Woolf
see also review
by Roger Blackburn
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Miquel Villalba (piano) 
