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SUMMARY:&quot\;The demoniac tune of the zarabanda”: erotic dance-songs i
 n Early Modern Spain - Prof Álvaro Torrente (Universidad Complutense de M
 adrid)
DTSTART:20141126T170000Z
DTEND:20141126T183000Z
UID:TALK55468@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:39522
DESCRIPTION:The zarabanda was a dance-song (baile cantado) originated in C
 entral America that flourished in Spain in the decades after 1580 and furt
 her disseminated beyond its borders as a court dance whose best known exam
 ple is the noble French sarabande. The severe criticism by moralists and a
 uthorities resulted in a prosecution by the Inquisition in México (1559) 
 and prohibition in Spain (1583 and 1615)\, owing to the obscenity of both 
 text and gestures\; still in 1623\, Giambattista Marino echoed this percep
 tion in his description of this “oscena danza” in L’Adone. No source
  of early zarabandas survives in music notation\, most likely because they
  were orally transmitted and never copied down\, but the very low number o
 f extant poetic texts (some with guitar alphabet)\, most of them in non Sp
 anish sources\, suggest that\, in the long run\, the proscription was succ
 essful.\n\nThis paper will explore the early zarabanda attending three dif
 ferent aspects: text\, music and gesture. First\, it will analyze the surv
 iving poems to illustrate the prevalence of explicit sexual references\; s
 econd\, applying the metric rules of Spanish sung poetry to the harmonic a
 nd rhythmic patterns of guitar zarabandas\, it will provide a written and 
 recorded reconstruction of its melody\; third\, it will argue with example
 s that even the most straightforward representation of the poetic content 
 would result into very explicit gestures that\, not surprisingly\, horrifi
 ed even the mildest censors in the officially decorous Spanish society of 
 the so-called Golden Age. The remarks of the theologian Francisco Suarez (
 De virtute et statu religionis\, 1610) regarding the different degrees of 
 sinfulness of words and music will be brought forward to explain how the m
 ost demoniac of all songs was eventually admitted into the church.\n\n\n\n
 Álvaro Torrente earned a degree in Musicology at the Universidad de Salam
 anca (1993) and a PhD at the University of Cambridge (1997). After two yea
 rs at Royal Holloway\, University of London\, he was appointed at the Univ
 ersidad Complutense de Madrid (1999)\, where he is currently Lecturer in M
 usic History and Director of the Instituto Complutense de Ciencias Musical
 es. Since 2007 he is member of the Directorium of the International Musico
 logical Society. He has been Visiting Scholar at NYU (1999) and Yale Unive
 rsity (2009-2010). His research and publications focus on vernacular genre
 s in the Iberian world and on Italian opera of the 17th and 18th centuries
 . He edited with Emilio Casares La ópera en España e Hispanoamérica (IC
 CMU\, 2001)\, and with Tess Knighton Devotional music in the Iberian World
 : the villancico and related genres (1450-1800) (Ashgate\, 2007)\, which r
 eceived the Stevenson Award of the American Musicological Society in 2008.
  With Ellen Rosand and Lorenzo Bianconi\, he is General Editor of The Oper
 as of Francesco Cavalli (Bärenreiter). His editions of La Calisto and L'E
 rcole Amante have been performed at the Bayerische Staatsoper\, the Royal 
 Opera House\, the Nederlandse Oper\, Theater Basel and the Grand Théâtre
  de Genève\, while his edition of Cesti's Orontea will open a new product
 ion in Oper Frankfurt in February 2015. His volume on the seventeenth cent
 ury music will be published shortly as part of the History of music in Spa
 in and Latinamerica currently published by Fondo de Cultura Económica.
LOCATION:Recital Room\, Faculty of Music
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