Revueltas and Chavez
Kate Molleson and Alejandro Madrid explore Silvestre Revueltas’s fiery friendship with fellow composer Carlos Chavez.
Kate Molleson and Alejandro Madrid explore Silvestre Revueltas’s fiery friendship with fellow composer Carlos Chavez.
Silvestre Revueltas was a blazingly energetic and politically charged musician, a whirlwind of a composer who lived through a time of great political and creative upheaval in Mexico. The French writer André Breton was stunned when he visited the country and found not one unified identity, but many strikingly different cultures existing side by side with all of their clashing values, creeds, and customs. This kaleidoscopic and sometimes jarring world is the musical universe of Revueltas, one of a generation of artists who, along with Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, tried to encompass a true sense of Mexican identity in their works after the country’s revolution. In his personal life Revueltas also lived a life of fiery extremes, before succumbing to an early death exasperated by alcoholism. Over the course of this week of programmes, Kate Molleson tries to shed some light on this forgotten composer, guiding us through the rhythms of Silvestre Revueltas’s colourful life with the help of Professor Alejandro Madrid of Harvard University. They track Revueltas’s moves from revolutionary Mexico, to prohibition-era America, to the trenches of the Spanish Civil War, and back to his homeland. Although most of Revueltas’s works date from the final decade of his short life, it is music which bursts with energy, colour, and humour. It is music which speaks with irony and passion about politics and people, about both the joys and hardships of life. It is music that speaks of Mexico.
In Tuesday’s episode, Kate and Alejandro explore Silvestre Revueltas’s fiery friendship with fellow composer Carlos Chavez which led him back from the USA to Mexico City in the 1920s to teach and conduct the National Symphony Orchestra of Mexico.
Colorines
English Chamber Orchestra
Gisèle Ben-Dor, conductor
Batik
Orquestre Filharmonica de Moravia
Jorge Perez Gomez, conductor
Cuauhnahuac
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Enrique Bátiz, conductor
String Quartet no 4 “Musica der Feria”
Matangi Quartet
Planos
Ă“nix Ensamble
José Areán, conductor
Redes (Part 1 “The Child’s Funeral”)
Orquesta Sinfonica de la Universidad de Guanajuato
Jose Luis Castillo, conductor
Produced by Sam Phillips for ±«Óătv Audio Wales & West
Last on
Music Played
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Silvestre Revueltas
Colorines
Performer: English Chamber Orchestra. Conductor: Gisèle Ben-Dor.- NAXOS : 8.572250.
- NAXOS.
- 15.
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Silvestre Revueltas
Batik
Orchestra: Moravská filharmonie Olomouc. Conductor: Jorge Pérez Gómez.- QUINDECIM RECORDINGS : QP-063.
- QUINDECIM RECORDINGS.
- 5.
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Silvestre Revueltas
Cuauhnahuac
Performer: Henryk Szeryng. Performer: Alfonso Moreno. Orchestra: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Conductor: Enrique Bátiz.- ASV : CD DCA-871.
- ASV.
- 5.
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Silvestre Revueltas
Musica da Feria
Ensemble: Matangi String Quartet.- CHALLENGE CLASSICS : CC-72353.
- CHALLENGE CLASSICS.
- 9.
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Silvestre Revueltas
Planos
Ensemble: Onix Ensemble. Conductor: José Areán.- URTEXT : JBCC 350.
- URTEXT.
- 9.
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Silvestre Revueltas
Redes Suite (The Child's Funeral)
Orchestra: Orquesta Sinfónica de la Universidad de Guanajuato. Conductor: José Luis Castillo.- QUINDECIM RECORDINGS : QP-123.
- QUINDECIM RECORDINGS.
- 3.
Broadcast
- Tue 23 Jul 2024 16:00±«Óătv Radio 3
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