Album of the day: Alberto Ginastera, “Estancia”

Alberto Ginastera
“Estancia” (Cd Naxos 8.557582)

Rock music fans probably first encountered Alberto Ginastera’s name on the cover of Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s album “Brain Salad Surgery”, which featured a rearranged version of the composer’s “Toccata” (which he enthusiastically approved).
One of the most important authors of classical music in Argentina, Alberto Ginastera left behind a limited production (about seventy works in total including operas, symphonic music, chamber music and film music) due to his own ferocious self-criticism, which led him to destroy many of his youthful scores and to ration out those of his maturity.

Meticulous to the point of exasperation, Ginastera scrupulously controlled the formal organization of his pieces (for him composing meant “creating an architecture that develops within time”) as well as every detail of the dazzling orchestration that comes to life in them. A true master of colors, he was influenced by both Debussy and the vitalism of Stravinsky and Bartók; just like these authors, he drew on the folk music of his country to infuse rhythmic energy into his works, seeking a synthesis between the cultured and the popular that attracted the attention of the composer Aaron Copland when he went
in South America in 1941 for a concert tour; Copland immediately sensed Ginastera’s artistic potential and invited him to the United States, launching the young composer’s international career.

One of his most famous works is the ballet “Estancia”, composed in 1941; Ginastera had obtained great critical and public success the previous year with another ballet, “Panambì” (also present in the CD) inspired by the magical legends of the Guaranì Indian people (magic and religious esotericism will be one of the constants in his production).
“Estancia” instead turns its gaze to the vast Argentine pampas, a territory that the author himself wanted to be «the authentic protagonist, which imposes its will on the other characters».

Making direct reference to the epic poem “Martin Fierro” by José Hernández (which celebrates the figure of the Gaucho, a solitary hero forced to a hard life in the interior of those plains) Ginastera designs colorful orchestral panoramas full of passionate melodic lyricism intertwined with virulent rhythmic passages of undoubted vitality.

Carlo Boccadoro, composer and conductor, was born in Macerata in 1963. He lives and works in Milan. He collaborates with soloists and orchestras in different parts of the world. He is the author of numerous books on musical subjects.

This text is taken from “Lunario della musica: Un disco per ogni giorno dell’anno” published by Einaudi, courtesy of the author and the publisher.