Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga (1806-1826)
- Sinfonía en re menor (c.1824)
Performers: Orquesta Filarmonia de España; Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos (1933-2014, director)
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Spanish composer. His father, Juan Simón Arriaga, had been organist,
royal clerk and schoolteacher at Guernica, and had become associated
with members of the Real Sociedad Bascongada de los Amigos del Pais, a
society upholding the ideals of the Enlightenment, before moving to
Bilbao in 1804 to become a merchant and shipowner. Arriaga's brother
Ramón Prudencio, his senior by 14 years, played the violin and guitar.
Both father and brother seem to have groomed the child for a musical
career. They established contacts with musical amateurs and
professionals, such as the aficionado José Luis Torres and José
Sobejano, sometime organist and maestro de capilla at Santiago, Bilbao;
with influential men of letters and musicians from Madrid court circles,
such as the poet Alberto Lista and the violinist Francesco Maria
Vaccari; and with the famous singer Manuel García. Reports on Arriaga's
opera in the Spanish press presumably appeared on the initiative of his
father and brother. The choice of texts for two patriotic hymns and the
idea to set a Spanish opera also reflect the influence the family had on
the boy. By September 1821 Arriaga had produced about 20 works, only
some of which are now extant. According to his father, Arriaga wrote his
first piece at the age of 11, and the autograph of 'Nada y mucho' seems
to confirm this. Originally a trio for violins, the piece was revised
by the addition of a bass and a text to the upper part. In 1818 he
composed an overture (op.1) for nonet which, surprisingly, already shows
many of the characteristic compositional strategies used in later
works. In 1819 he wrote his opera 'Los esclavos felices', of which only
the overture and fragments of several arias remain.
The motets Stabat mater and O salutaris hostia were probably composed
for the capilla. The texts of the patriotic hymns 'Ya luce en este
hemisferio' and 'Cantabros nobles' fit the political situation of the
trienio liberal (1820-23). In September 1821 Arriaga went abroad. He was
introduced by García and Justo de Machado (the Spanish ambassador in
Paris) to Cherubini, who was at that time one of the inspectors of the
Paris Conservatoire. Arriaga was admitted to Fétis's newly created class
of counterpoint and fugue and to the violin class of Pierre Baillot and
his assistants. He won prizes for counterpoint and fugue in 1823 and
1824, and in the latter year Fétis made him teaching assistant. A
symphony, showing the influence of Beethoven and uncannily reminiscent
of Schubert's Fourth Symphony, was one of Arriaga's last works. Pedro
Albéniz's letter to Arriaga's father and Fétis's report lead to the
conclusion that Arriaga died from exhaustion and a pulmonary infection.
After his death his belongings were sent to Bilbao and on the death of
his father in 1836 his papers were divided between the five heirs.
Arriaga's short career was heavily marked by a strong sense of
competition. A dramatic impetus coupled with a flair for finding
remarkably well-poised musical structures pervades all of his works,
both vocal and instrumental. Melodies always seem to have come easily to
him; a remarkable progression in the handling of accompaniment and
orchestration can be seen. In his Parisian period Arriaga discovered a
technique of continuous transformation of musical material. He was
always fond of chromaticisms and used a chromatic idée fixe in most of
his works from the very beginning.
