The young composer leans over his latest music composition, his brown eyes shining in the light of the candles, for it is very late at night. His brain is teeming with musical ideas, so many that he can barely write them down. At last, his string quartet starts to take shape. He is ecstatic but worn with fatigue. At last, he has tamed his many melodic ideas and made something of extraordinary beauty. Little does he know that his fatigue is partly due to an illness which will strike him down at the age of nineteen.
These were my thoughts as my string quartet and I played music by Juan Chrisostomo Arriaga. The thoughts are strictly my own imagination but were vividly present to my mind as we played his beautiful music. Ah, to die so young! With so much talent! But I understood his feverish enthusiasm, made from youthful passion.
Here is some biographical information from the score for the Three String Quartets of Arriaga, published by International Music Company:
Juan Crisostomo Arriaga, born in 1806 in Bilbao Spain, died in 1826. At the age of 11, he composed an octet; at the age of 12, he composed an overture for orchestra, at 14, he composed an opera. In 1822, he went to study in Paris at the Conservatory. He studied violin, harmony and counterpoint. In less than three months he had a perfect knowledge of Harmony and in two years he was a master of Counterpoint and Fugue. In 1824 he received a Conservatory appointment as a coach in Harmony and Counterpoint. At this time he composed a Symphony and three String Quartets. He died in 1826 from a lung disease.
No comments:
Post a Comment