Loss of a Great Voice

Capital, Monasterio de Pedralbes, Barcelona

©EOP

For those of us who love the music of medieval and renaissance Europe, and especially that of Spain during the great age of pilgrimage to Santiago, November 2011 was a particularly sad month, for it witnessed the passing of a magnificent talent, the Catalan soprano Montserrat Figueras. With crystalline tone and great emotional intensity, Figuras brought to life the songs, and particularly the religious music, the lullabies and the laments, that were familiar to pilgrims on the route to Santiago in its great apex of the 15th and 16th centuries. In concert with her husband the inimitable master of early music Jordi Savall, her son and daughter and their several choral and instrumental groups including Hespèrion (later renamed Hespèrion XXI) and Capella Reial de Catalunya, Figueras performed and recorded some of the most haunting music of Spain's "Golden Age" (as I write I am listening to a gripping recording of Tomas Luis de Victoria's "Cantica Beatae Virginis" by those groups with Figueras as featured soloist). A multifaceted talent, she was also at home performing music by contemporary masters like the Estonian Aarvo Pärt. It will always be a regret that while I have had the great privilege of hearing her husband and her daughter Arianna Saval perform in concerts, I never had an opportunity to hear Montserrat Figueras live. 

Many of the world's major newspapers including the New York Times the Guardian and El Pais printed obituaries after her death. 

Her funeral was held in one of the most beautiful and beloved sites in Barcelona, the 
monastery of Pedralbes. 

While we no longer are able to hear her in concert, Figueras has left us with an extensive recorded archive in which she sang some of the most beautiful music ever written in Europe and around the Mediterranean Basin, and for that we must be thankful indeed.. 

Music

San Juan de Ortega, Burgos, Spain,  September 2011

©eop

Sitting in the family waiting area of Sibley Hospital nervously awaiting the surgeon's report (thankfully for a fairly minor procedure) on my wife, it seems a good time to get back on track and pen a few words. I had intended to have a completed report on my September-October walk on the Camino Frances posted by now, but events, including some family medical issues and the holiday season, have made that impossible. The season was not without its pleasures, not least two performances by the Folger Consort. In December they collaborated with Piffaro (the Philadelphia based wind band of which I admit to being something of a groupie) and vocal soloists to present a wonderful concert of renaissance era Spanish Christmas music, "O Magnum Mysterium." Last Saturday we went to the (earthquake damaged and partially shrouded) Washington National Cathedral to hear the instrumental musicians of the Consort and the ethereal voices of Anonymous 4 perform music by Hildegard of Bingen and various 12^th century French composers, a stunning experience hearing the music in the type of venue for which it was composed, played and sung by true masters of early music. At some date in the not too distant future, I would love to hear live performances of some of the instrumental and vocal music associated with the Camino de Santiago played and sung by the Consort and Anonymous 4. Perhaps they can be persuaded to give such a concert. There is a fantastic CD of music from the Codex Calixtinus by Anonymous 4, but despite the wonders of modern audio recording, a live performance is still special.

I must get back to surveying Camino music as several good recordings have recently come to my attention. This is being written a few days after the last music store in Washington, DC carrying classical CDs announced it is closing. No more browsing, the serendipitous source of many CDs in my collection. Scrolling through lists on websites is just not the same. On-line one can listen to snippets of the recordings, recalling the record store booths of my childhood where one could sample records, but reading the album notes while holding the disc has been my avenue of serendipitous discovery. At various music websites, it is easy to find recordings advertised and promoted by major labels, but much recorded early music, including that linked to pilgrimage, is on small or private labels with budgets barely large enough to cover production costs. Only with a little luck and reports from a network of others who share the arcane taste for early music can one find these titles.

With the holidays over and medical issues under control, I hope, the usually grim weather of winter is a good time to get back to writing about pilgrimage issues, so I plan to write some additional postings in the next few weeks. At least I have managed to go through many of the 2,000+ photographs from my autumn pilgrimage and do a bit of editing, so I might even post a photo blog on Flicker or similar.

Meanwhile, what is the fate of the purloined Codex Calixtinus? While I was on the Camino no one seemed to know if it had been located and returned to the Cathedral archive, and many peregrinos were unaware of the theft. Since returning I have not had the opportunity to do research on the topic, another task for the next few weeks.