Joaquín Rodrigo - The Works of 1982 – Part IV
(English/Español) Monday, December 19, 2011 If the Concerto para una fiesta is an “incontrovertibly Spanish work”, in the composer’s own words, the final creation of 1982, the Cántico de San Francisco de Asís , could not be more different. Invited by the Franciscan Order in Spain to set St Francis’s ‘Canticle of the Creatures’ to music, to mark the 800th anniversary of the Saint’s birth, Rodrigo responded to this commission with music of a quite new kind, in which ‘Spanish’ influence is notably absent. The composer seems in fact to have wanted to create a work in the great European choral tradition, confessing that he found his task both pleasant and easy: “I must say that it did not require too much effort from me – it was as though the Saint was inspiring me… In this sublime poetry all nature is reflected, as I feel it. It is evoked in all its splendour, all its beauty, all its joy and all its sadness… In the Cántico de San Francisco I wanted to capture in my music those