NOTES ON THE IBERIA

by Joseph Horowitz

Perhaps no other keyboard music has been as misleadingly popularized as Isaac Albéniz’s Iberia. Of the twelve sections, five were transcribed for orchestra by Enrique Fernández Arbós, the other seven by Carlos Surinach. Many American listeners mainly know Iberia through the familiar Arbós versions of Triana and El Albaicín. Thus reconveyed, Iberia is a collection of slick touristic postcards.

The Iberia Albéniz composed for piano between 1905 and 1908 is anything but slick. It is monumental, and of monumental difficulty. It so densely packs its fragrant tunes and smart rhythms that ten fingers seem insufficient to master its leaps, hand-crossings, and knotty chordal masses. Albéniz himself confided to Manuel de Falla that he came close to destroying the manuscript because it seemed unplayable. According to Arthur Rubinstein, he was once asked to play parts of Iberia by Albéniz’s widow and daughter. “It might shock you to hear me leave out many notes in order to project the essence of the music,” he replied. They insisted, and he offered Triana – and was told that his performance was “exactly” as Albéniz had played it.

Even certain recordings of Iberia omit notes by the bushel. But Albéniz was long past his fabled pianistic prime when he composed Iberia. The density of this music, and its self-evident pianistic difficulties, are crucial to its affect. So, too, is the harsh or tangy chromaticism this density achieves. Hearing Iberia as Albéniz composed it – especially the third and fourth books, with their dissonant star clusters and sonic nebulae – we should not be amazed to discover that Oliver Messiaen called it “The wonder of the piano, the masterpiece of Spanish music which takes its place – and perhaps the highest – among the stars of first magnitude of the king of instruments.” Debussy, who knew and was influenced by Albéniz, and whose own music so often evokes Spain, was another enthusiast:

There are few works in music to compare with El Albaicín. Although the popular themes are not exactly reproduced, it is the work of one who has absorbed them, listening until they have passed into his music, leaving no trace of a boundary line. Never has music attained to such diverse, such colorful impressions as in Eritaña. One’s eyes close, dazzled by such wealth of imaginery. There are many other things in this Iberia collection, wherein Albéniz has put what is best in him.

The composer of Iberia lived a fairy-tale life. He first played the piano in public in 1864 at the age of four – and with such skill that trickery was suspected. He was taken to Paris but was considered too young for the Conservatoire. He stowed away on a boat to South America, made his way to San Francisco, and eventually returned to Spain – by which time he was all of 13. He eventually studied with Liszt, and also with Felipe Pedrell, the founding father of Spanish musical nationalism.

Albéniz’s extensive catalogue includes operas, symphonic works, and five sonatas among many other keyboard pieces in a style much plainer than any page of Iberia. Of his earlier piano pieces, Albéniz himself wrote:

There are among them a few things that are not completely worthless. The music is a bit infantile, plain, spirited; but, in the end, the people, our Spanish people, are something of all that. I believe that the people are right when they continue to be moved by Córdoba, Mallorca, by the copla of the Sevillanas, by the Serenata, and Granada. In all of them I now note that there is less musical science, less of the grand idea, but more color, sunlight, flavor of olives. That music of youth, with its little sins and absurdities that almost point out the sentimental affectation…appears to me like the carvings in the Alhambra, those peculiar arabesques that say nothing with their turns and shapes, but which are like the air, like the sun, like the blackbirds or like the nightingales of its gardens. They are more valuable than all else of Moorish Spain, which, though we may not like it, is the true Spain.

His last composition and unquestioned masterpiece, Iberia is not a suite. Rather, its four books of three pieces each comprise a collection of nouvelles impressions chiefly inspired by the southern province of Andalusia. (And yet Albéniz was a Catalan, born 100 miles from Barcelona.) Pedro Carboné comments:

I grew up with Iberia. I learned my first Iberia piece at 13. My teacher then Pilar Bayona used to include “iberias” in almost all her recitals. Iberia recordings were background music in my home. As a matter of fact I don’t remember ever listening to an Iberia piece “for the first time;” it seems this music has always been in my head. I had no doubt that one day I would play all of Iberia, and it has taken 30 years for me to feel confident enough to do it. Even though Iberia can be a bit too much for the listener (and certainly for the performer), even though the pieces were conceived independently, I think it is important to listen to the whole thing live at least once in order to understand the magnitude and beauty of Albéniz’s achievement. We do that with much longer masterpieces without complaining (Bach, Wagner…). So why not Albéniz?