It is difficult to think of a major composer - and he
was a major
composer - whose output is as small as that of Manuel da Falla. There is
only one full-scale orchestral work,
Nights in the gardens of
Spain, which is here provided as a bonus at the end of the documentary;
apart from that there are four stage works comprising two ballets and two
operas, none of which lasts more than an hour, and a small portfolio of
songs, piano music and chamber works including a harpsichord concerto. His
only work which might have occupied a full evening would have been the
sprawling cantata
Atlantida, which was left as an incomplete torso
at the time of the composer's death in Argentinean exile. But at the very
least evidence of Falla's genius can be clearly demonstrated by his opera
La vida breve, which rises above a pretty disastrous plot to reveal
a stunning sense of atmosphere and a series of original touches which
transform the lame-backed scenario into something pretty close to a
masterpiece.
The documentary here focuses to a large degree on the events of Falla's
life, with an emphasis on his early career and influences. It does not
provide much in the way of an explanation for the reasons why Falla felt his
life to be so threatened that he left for Argentina following Franco's
victory in the Spanish Civil War - he did not have the high political
profile of contemporary figures such as Lorca - but it does emphasise the
ill-health from which Falla suffered throughout his career, and it takes the
opportunity to present some of his major works in performances spearheaded
by Charles Dutoit and his Montreal Symphony Orchestra. Only
some
works, mind you. Although Dutoit has provided us with one of the best
recorded performances of the ballet
The three-cornered hat, there
is nothing from that score here except a brief section of the Neighbours'
Dance played in a piano transcription. And the performance here of
El
amor brujo, so well recorded by Dutoit on his Decca CD, is ruined by a
mezzo-soprano whose credentials as an authentic gypsy girl are vitiated by a
raucous delivery and unsteadiness of tone which is a long way from the
cultivated manner which the remainder of the score demands - comparison with
Huguette Tourangeau on Dutoit's audio recording shows just how much we miss
in subtlety here.
That aside, the remainder of the performances are very good indeed, and
one might wish that the version of
Master Peter's puppet show we
hear on this documentary could be made available in its own right. Alicia da
Larrocha, who plays
Nights in the gardens of Spain, is of course
incomparable in this music; and the images of the gardens which Falla
describes, seen in full on the accompanying performance, add a sense of
richness and atmosphere to the music even when some individual sequences of
pictures come around rather too often. Sections of the performance are
incorporated into the documentary. Larry Weinstein is to be commended too
for allowing us to hear substantial sections of music without intrusive
'voice-over', and the balletic staging of
El amor brujo has just
the right sense of abandon which enhances rather than detracts from the
score. There are also some real gems among the smaller items, such as
Zabaleta performing a harp transcription of the
Serenata Andaluza
and a film of Joaquin Nin-Culmell who actually gave the first performance of
the
Homage to Paul Dukas.
There is also a three-page booklet note which oddly enough seems to take a
more sometimes more critical view of Falla than the generally sympathetic
documentary. This anonymous note even attempts to portray Falla's period in
Argentina not as exile but simply as a response to a request for a concert
engagement, although the writer does not explain why Falla then prolonged
his stay in South America not only throughout the Second World War but
beyond it. The films date from 1991 and, as with the film of Nin-Culmell,
now have a documentary status in their own right.
Paul Corfield Godfrey
