Cinco Poemas de Bécquer – Carol Barnett

Composer: Carol Barnett

Text by: Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer

Instrumentation: SSAATTBB, soprano recorder, guitar, wind chimes

Duration: complete work: c 11:30
    single movements: 1) c 2:30  2) c 1:00  3) c 3:00  4) c 2:30   5) c 1:45

Date Written:  1979

Composer’s note: Cinco Poemas de Bécquer was one of a series of works commissioned in 1979 by the Bratnober family of St. Paul, MN, to honor their father, Harry L. Bratnober. The terms of this particular commission specified a choral work with Spanish or French text. I chose these five poems by Spanish poet Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (1836-1870), who wrote during the transition from the Romantic to the modern era, and whose work often has a certain air of mystery and nostalgia. The third poem refers to Ofelia; I have added a few lines from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

text

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