On the occasion of the exhibition Francisco Goya, Los Caprichos, the National Gallery, in collaboration with the Department of Music Studies of the University of Ioannina , presents Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco ‘s work Caprichos de Goya op. 195. The event will present 16 Caprichos , as a guitar recital by the department’s graduate guitarists. This is a great musical work, which has been presented worldwide but only fragmentarily in Greece, which in this particular concert will be heard alongside the screening of Goya ‘s original works , thus creating a unique experience.
In early 1961, Francisco Goya ‘s engravings inspired the composer Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (1895-1968) to write his own Caprichos for solo guitar op.195. Following the encouragement of the famous Andres Segovia , the Italian composer of Sephardic descent, he selected 23 engravings (and a similar copperplate engraving) and completed in just one and a half months what he described as his most ambitious work for guitar. Consisting of 4 books-units of 6 Caprichos, lasting a total of about 85 minutes , he dedicated it to his painter son, Lorenzo. The work was published in 1970, two years after the composer’s death.
Sometimes features of the Spanish musical language, such as the Phrygian mode or turns around the same note, and sometimes rhythmic shapes, make clear references to the era in which Goya lived, as well as to the distant Spanish roots of Tedesco himself. However, the composer handles this material without trying to make a kind of programmatic music. Tedesco presents his own interpretation of the engravings of the Spanish painter and of spiritual Spanishness. He develops a different compositional style for each Capricho , always with intense expressiveness, narrative character and multi-layered symbolism.
The traditional Fandango, Seguidilla, Bolero and Jota, which are based on characteristic flamenco guitar motifs and techniques, are creatively combined with elements of bitonality, expanded harmony, modernism and, in some cases, even serialism. At the same time, other Caprichos reveal clear signs of neoclassicism, through the use of borrowed themes from the Gregorian chant, Renaissance villancicos, antistic forms, as well as French Baroque dances.
Text, program and teaching: Dr. Yiannis Efstathopoulos, Classical Guitar and Ensemble Teacher at the TMS
Date: Sunday, December 21, Time: 18:30
Venue: National Gallery, Onassis Foundation Amphitheater
Performed by students of the Department of Music Studies of the University of Ioannina
Co-organized with the University of Ioannina
Admission is free
