Bücher der Reihe Latin American & Spanish Vocal Music Collection

In this beautifully edited book, you find 17 art songs for voice and piano by the Colombian composer Jaime Le?n (1921-2015). The book has an introductory study that contextualizes the composer and the poets. It also provides a diction guide, translation of the poems into English and their phonetic transcription. The study is presented in Spanish and English. The book is the second edition, revised in 2019. The author is Dr. Patricia Caicedo, a soprano and musicologist specializing in the Latin American and Iberian art song repertoire. She has recorded the songs and worked along with the composer for many years. Caicedo is the author of several books about the Iberian and Latin American art song and the director of the Barcelona Festival of Song, a summer program dedicated to the study of the history and interpretation of the Latin American and Iberian art song in Spanish, Catalan, and Portuguese.

Jaime León is one of the most important Colombian and Latin American art music composers of the XX century.The book includes The song cycle Canciones de Navidad on poetry by Rigoberto Cordero. Rigoberto Cordero y León (Cuenca, Ecuador, 1944-2001), was an important Ecuadorian poet, essayist and music critic. The cycle is fascinating because it integrates very varied elements that include harmonies reminiscent of those of American musical theater and Colombian folk rhythms such as Bambuco. The syncopated rhythm of Bambuco appears in El asnillo y el buey and Cancioncilla de Navidad. Villancico de la estrella (Christmas carol of the star) El asnillo y el buey (The donkey and the ox) Cancioncilla de navidad (Christmas song) Villancico de las campanas (Christmas carol of the bells)Another Christmas-themed song that does not belong to the cycle is Canción de Noel, with text by Eduardo Castillo. Considered a Parnassian, symbolist and modernist poet, Eduardo Castillo (Zipaquirá, Colombia, 1889 - Bogotá, 1938) was a regular visitor of coffees and literary gatheringsThe Canción de noel (Song of Noel), also in Bambuco rhythm, describes the Christmas night.

Sobre el océano is a critical edition and a complete voice and piano reduction of a Mexican Zarzuela by Antonio de Maria y Campos, a XIX-century composer virtually unknown until today. As with all books in the collection, this volume provides a bilingual -Spanish-English- introductory study contextualizing the work and the composer. It also provides translations into English of the libretto and phonetic (IPA) transcriptions.The Spanish Zarzuela, a form of light opera with spoken dialogue interspersed with musical numbers and sung lyrics, was the most popular musical genre in the second decade of the 19th century in cities such as Madrid, Mexico City, Havana, and Buenos Aires. Unlike the opera, which was established as the spectacle of the elites, the Zarzuela had a greater impact on the popular classes by describing regional uses and customs of urban and rural Spain and, later, the traditions of the new American nations. To recover Sobre el océano, a work written in 1897 by Antonio de María y Campos and Manuel Larrañaga Portugal, just at the height of Zarzuela in Mexico, allows to understand Mexican history and culture of the late nineteenth century and offers singers the opportunity to interpret a genre of great beauty for the enjoyment of audiences around the world. This score is a gem to be discovered.