Luis de Pablo

Luis de Pablo

Luis de Pablo (born 28 January 1930) is a Spanish composer belonging to the generation of Spanish composers named by Cristóbal Halffter as Generación del 51.

Life

Luis de Pablo was born in Bilbao, but after losing his father in the Spanish Civil War, he went with his mother and siblings to live in Madrid from age six. Although he started to compose at the age of 12, his circumstances made it impossible to consider an artistic career, and so he studied law at the Universidad Complutense. For a short time after graduating in 1952, he was employed as legal advisor to Iberia Airlines, but soon resigned this post in order to pursue a career in music. Although he received composition lessons from Maurice Ohana and Max Deutsch, he was essentially an autodidact in composition. His participation at the Darmstadt courses in 1959 led to the performance of some of his works under Boulez and Maderna (Heine 2001).

He was awarded Spain's Premio Nacional de Música for composition in 1991.

In Spain, he founded several organizations: Nueva Música, Tiempo y Música, and Alea and organized several contemporary music concert series, for example, the Forum Musical and Bienal de Música Contemporánea de Madrid. He was particularly concerned with promoting understanding in Spain of the Second Viennese School, publishing translations of Stuckenschmidt’s biography of Arnold Schoenberg in 1961, and the writings of Anton Webern in 1963 (Heine 2001). He is much in demand as a teacher, both in Spain and internationally.

Selected works

Chamber music

• Anatomías for viola solo, 2 clarinets, horn, trombone and harp (2005–2007)
• Ex voto for violin and viola (1995)
• Monólogo for viola solo (1990–1992)

Choral music

• Yo Lo Vi for 12 voices (1970)
• Passio

Orchestral music

• Las Orillas (1990)

Operas

• La señorita Cristina (2000)

Film music

• La caza (Carlos Saura, 1965)
• Peppermint Frappé (Carlos Saura, 1967)
• El jardín de las delicias (Carlos Saura, 1970)
• El Espíritu de la Colmena (Victor Erice, 1973)

Discography

• Libro de imágenes, Segunda Lectura, Metáforas. Stradivarius
• Senderos del aire and works for flute. Col Legno
• Dibujos, Fragments from Kiu, Chamber Concerto etc. ADDA
• Tarde de Poetas. Harmonia Mundi
• Piano Trio. Ermitage ERM 413
• Visto de Cerca, para 3 músicos y cinta; Chaman, obra electronica. Hispavox LP (30) 130 202
• Al Son que Tocan, Homenaje an Antonio Machado. RCA LP SRL2-2444

Writings

• Aproximación a una estética de la música contemporánea, 1968
• Lo que sabemos de música, 1968

References

• Heine, Christiane. 2001. "Pablo (Costales), Luis de". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan Publishers.

External links

General purpose

• "biography" (in French). IRCAM.

Listening

• Luis de Pablo at the Avant Garde Project has FLAC files made from high-quality LP transcriptions available for free download.