Fantasìa Sobre El Flamenc
Judith Shatin
About this work:
Fantasìa Sobre El Flamenco is my musical response to a visit to the 1998 Corpus Christi fair in Granada, Spain, where the music and dance of the flamenco was all-enveloping. It is a complex music with a fascinating variety of forms. I have thought about this experience in music, influenced by the mixture of civilizations emblematic of Spain’s Moorish past. One of the striking aspects of the dance is the intermingling of qualities: sensuousness and surrender, pride and violence. I was particularly struck by the cante jondo, with its intense and dark qualities. In Fantasìa Sobre El Flamenco sinuous melodies that have a conversational flavor are interrupted by characteristic rhythmic bursts reminiscent of zapateado (toe and heel clicking). These two musical ideas collide, creating different rhythmic planes. The cante winds its way through the ensemble, though interrupted by violent staccato bursts. Fantasìa Sobre El Flamenco was commissioned by Jeffrey Silberschlag for St. Mary’s Brass, who premiered it in 1998, and recorded it for the CD Hearing the Call: 20th century American Brass Music on the Sonora label (SO22591).
Fanfare said: "Fantasía sobre el Flamenco for two trumpets, two trombones, and tuba (1998), a clash of bright and dark melodies borne by regimented and free-flowing rhythms."
Year composed: 1998
Duration: 00:09:45
Ensemble type: Chamber or Jazz Ensemble, Without Voice:Brass Quintet
Instrumentation: 1 Horn in F, 2 Trumpet, 1 Trombone, 1 Tuba
Instrumentation notes: There is also a version for 2 trpts, 2 trmbs, tuba; and 2 trpts, hrn, 2 trmbs