Manuel Blancafort was
the grand old man of Catalonian music
until his death in 1987. With this third
edition in its exploration of his piano
music, Naxos brings together music written
during the composer’s mid-to-late 20s.
And what attractive music it is! The
young Catalonian composer had a wonderful
ear for keyboard sonorities. This was
developed in part, apparently, through
his involvement in the family pianola
roll business. This is music full of
colour and beauty.
Appropriately, our
guide is Miquel Villalba, a native of
Barcelona and the pianist for this series
of recordings. Villalba clearly loves
this music. He is a fine advocate and
a sensitive pianist: just listen to
the gossamer sounds he produces in the
first of the Cants íntims,
and his play with the inner voices of
the last piece of the same suite, for
example. He also wrote the brief but
informative booklet notes.
The ghost of Debussy
hovers over all of the music on this
disc, but haunts the first two suites
in particular. Camins is full
of lush chords, flocks of scattered
notes and modal quirks and concludes
with a hint of a swagger in its final
movement.
Cants íntims
inhabits the same sound-world but feels
more of a piece, with the melodic material
of the first song being bent and softly
manipulated by supple fingers to reflect
changes of mood as a lake reflects clouds
that pass above it. For all the Debussy,
there is also something Lisztian about
the treatment of the thematic material,
particularly in the two Epitafi movements.
Although largely at
the same time as its disc mates, El
parc d'atraccions has a stronger
sense of purpose and feels immediately
a more mature work. It integrates Catalonian
folksong and paints not individual pictures
but the scenario of an uneasy jaunt
through a fairground. Debussy's influence
remains and is coupled with that of
Les Six and a touch of the Stravinsky
of Petrushka. Of the six pieces in the
suite, III. Abstracciones, with
its sudden flashes of notes sending
ripples across its melancholy surface,
and VI. Prop del dàncing,
with its cheeky reference to Dvořák's
Humoresque, in particular
will stay with me. IV. Polca de l'equilibrista
is also an attractively jaunty tune
which sounds a little poker-faced here,
but this is nonetheless effective.
The recital concludes
with the Pastoral in G, a bright
neo-classical sonatina with danceable
rhythms.
Anyone who cares about
early 20th century pianism in general,
and French (or Catalonian) piano music
in particular, will enjoy this disc
and play it repeatedly. I certainly
did.
Tim Perry
Miquel Villalba (piano)
