The fragment of a Zarzuela de Chapí that was misplaced in emails sounds a century later | Culture | EUROtoday

The determine of the mailman offers loads of play as a tangle catalyst within the zarzuelas, however not often assumes the prominence of which he walks via The Revoltosa of Chapí And that neither the composer nor the librettists of this jewel of the style Chic sensational lyric sainete, which may be seen, from tomorrow Wednesday to April 27, on the Teatro de la Zarzuela.

At some level Chapí recovered his draft, however by then it was too late: the vertiginous equipment of the Zarzuelas manufacturing system had taken him alongside one other means. It was the musicologist Enrique Mejías García who in 2009 discovered a discount for singing and piano in a poorly cataloged folder of the National Library. “It appeared transfer between leftovers and musical miscellaneous for band and sexteto, and immediately realized that it was the famous and scattered number,” says the specialist, who says he is aware of the rating of reminiscence. “We must not rule out that Chapí came to orchestrate it, but if so, it has not left trace in the files.”

Nor is it clear the place the composer was whereas complying with the deliveries of The Revoltosa. The solely clue on his whereabouts comes from a letter with out relationship (“here, three kilometers from the town”) through which he’s very counterpart from the inefficiency of the postal service. “It is more than likely to be locked in a rural enclave, near some spa town, maybe in the stone monastery, in the pachacas or even in the estate of El Escorial of his patron and friend José Borrell.” From there I despatched the drafts of a piece that was already introduced within the free of newspapers as the good musical occasion of the season.

The motion of The Revoltosa It develops in a Madrid corrala of the time, the place the flirtatious and disinhibited mari-peppers awakens the misgivings of its neighbors. “What I discovered was nothing but the unpublished third of the end of the first painting, in which Gorgonia, Soledad and Encarna throw slander against their rival and plan a revenge.” The scene may be learn in one of many pages torn from the manuscript libretto by José López Silva and Carlos Fernández Shaw. “Chapí boasts of his enormous ability to adapt by adding the famous Guajira that Solitude sings for greater show of the Tiple Luisa Campos, a whole sex symbol newly hired by the Apollo ”.

For months, Mejías devoted himself to crossing the correspondence of Chapí collected within the Legado Fernández Shaw of the Juan March Foundation with the orchestral supplies of the SGAE Archive, the place he works as an editor and documentary filmmaker. “I came to the conclusion that the loss of the draft could well take Chapí to rethink the structure of The Revoltosa“According to the musicologist, the third is not just any number, of those that the composers discard lightly and recycled later.” It was, in fact, the genesis of the work, the first melody that pointed in her notebook in June 1897. And my experience tells me that the scribbles of that moleskine They were reserved for the great idea. ”

So a lot in order that Isamay Benavente, inventive director of the Teatro de la Zarzuela, was clear when she completed studying the outcomes of Mejías. “I could not avoid thinking, in comparative terms, in the world impact that would have the appearance of some lost page of Carmen o The traviata”, Confesses the primary girl on the head of the Jovellanos Street theater since its basis in 1856.” The third in question is very brief, it does not last more than three minutes, but its enormous symbolic value will serve as an appetizer to a project that, from the next season, will continue to bet on the recovery of our musical heritage. “

For this objective, Benavente commissioned the trainer Juan de Udaeta for an orchestration of the third through which Mejías himself has additionally participated. “What I have heard in the essays reminds me a bit of the passage of Windsor’s cheerful comadres of the second act of Falstaffin which three women make fun of the protagonist and tend a trap. ”A reference nothing informal, if we take into consideration that Chapí went to the premiere of Verdi’s opera on the Teatro Real in early 1894.“ To underline the comic character of the number we have titled it ¡And, and, and, and!because everything is humor and fun in The Revoltosaa title that in each scene takes a laugh ”.

The outcome will probably be offered to the general public from tomorrow in a double program with The batting of Chueca and as a part of a brand new scenic idea of Juan Echanove that can direct from the pit Óliver Díaz. Soprano Berna Perles will embody the seductive Mari-Pepa, sufferer of insults (“Miá The presumed! ”,“ How rabid goes! ”) Of the trio of the patio, composed of the mezzo Blanca Valido (Soledad) and the Sopranos Milagros Martín (Gorgonia) and María Rodríguez (Encarna). “The anger of the neighbors is in Crescendo with the music,” explains Benavente. “And not by chance the orchestra ends up evoking the chapinian universe of The bravías”.

Everything takes place in just 171 measures, in which the touches of the violins and woods counterpoating seem to dialogue with the inconsolatable women. “While it might be not so enticing, melodically, the third exhibits among the greatest lyrical qualities within the composer,” says Mejías, who has dedicated years to copying scores of Zarzuela. “In order to remain trustworthy in model, we determined to not add any instrumental rareness. We have solely allowed a license that we contemplate very a lot of Chapí’s style.” It refers back to the timbal alone that sounds on the finish of the quantity, such because the accelerated steps of a mailman who arrives 127 years late to his vacation spot.