Libro del Frío
Libro del Frío - Imagen 2
Libro del Frío - Imagen 3
Libro del Frío - Imagen 4

Libro del Frío

VI. Frío de Límites

14,95€

The Spanish label IBS Classical releases Libro del Frío (Book of Cold), a major work by composer José María Sánchez-Verdú, based on the celebrated poetry collection by Antonio Gamoneda, one of Spain’s most influential contemporary poets and winner of the Cervantes Prize. Written for countertenor, organ, orchestra and five spatialized instrumental groups, Libro del Frío is an immersive sound architecture conceived for the Cathedral of León, where it was premiered in 2008 on the occasion of the 25th International Organ Festival. In this recording, the haunting voice of Carlos Mena finds its perfect echo in the vast resonances of the sacred space, joined by Óscar Candendo at the organ and the Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, under the composer’s direction. Drawing on the deep musicality of Gamoneda’s verse, Sánchez-Verdú creates a unique dialogue between word, space and sound. His composition unfolds as a seven-part cycle —with interludes and the final organ work Límina— where silence and light become structural elements of the music. The result is an experience that blurs the boundaries between liturgy and abstraction, between human voice and cathedral architecture. In his own reflection included in the booklet, Antonio Gamoneda writes that through Sánchez-Verdú’s work he has “discerned new lights upon the nature and function of poetry and music, and upon the elements they share.” Recorded live in the Cathedral of León and released in 2025, this album stands as a meeting point between two of Spain’s most visionary creators — a meditation on sound, time and transcendence.

BOOKLET

14,95€

Categorías: ,

Libro del frío

[Book of Cold]

(for countertenor, organ, orchestra and five spatialized instrumental groups)

Libro del frío is a beautiful collection of poems by Antonio Gamoneda I availed myself of as the basis and inspiration for my musical work by the same title. This project had been on my mind for a long time before I could eventually carry it out when I was asked to premiere it at the Cathedral of León International Organ Festival on its 25th anniversary in 2008.  

The images stemming from Gamoneda’s lines trigger a cataclysm in my imagination which brings about both sonorous and spatial metaphors filled with textures, scents, echoes, resonances and colours: indeed, they are music. For Gamoneda, the distance between poetry and music is, as it is for me, slight; in other words – perhaps it is the same? – in his poetry, the sound and its resonance are constant, as some of his lines show: “The auricular half-light is never touched by the sound of day-break. Silence lows in the hidden vaults and slides down your membranes. Birds whistle and your passion is deaf. You are no longer in your ears.”; or “The nightingale still echoes in the invisible garden”. The associations with sonorous worlds are quite recurring, and the poet’s images conjure up acoustic depth, the vibration of sonorous bodies, sublimed natures or the recesses of a stylized daily life, unfathomable abysses and remote vaults. In his poetry, Antonio Gamoneda’s inner world, with its distinctive rhythms and sounds, emerges as a sonorous, musical space, and is a primeval substratum of the final word (perhaps a babbling?). This ultimate word is no more than a surface of semantic meaning that shrouds that essence which, to the very end, is always and solely musical. As Gamoneda writes: “Will even music stop?”. I believe I admire Gamoneda especially as a creator of different kinds of music produced within rhythm, from the compenetration of matter and word as well as from his own beat and recitation. 

All these associations, and even more, were at the core of my composition of Libro del frío. The poetic word —the melody created by Gamoneda— transubstantiated into the voice of countertenor Carlos Mena, my admired friend, who performed remarkably in his role as El/La Seminarista in my musical work El viaje a Simorgh (The Journey to Simorgh) in Madrid’s Teatro Real the year before. The organ is definitely the core instrument to the music in Libro del frío, for both the venue and the Festival that fostered this project; and above all, for being the instrument which stirs the most profound emotions in my senses and in my memory. The echo of AMTAR, a musical piece I wrote for the Iberian organ in Santa Marina la Real in León for this festival some years ago, may as well be hovering about the work that is at stake here.

I shall add that the score of Libro del frío opens onto a locus that is magic to me: it is León Cathedral, which provides an architecture of space, light and time each and every sound and silence merging into this work were originated for. The whole musical dramaturgy of this composition is closely linked with the architectural space of the Cathedral. Hence, the orchestra is divided into and spaced out in different points of the temple, in different “choirs” (perhaps choirs of angels?); its distribution in the venue of the Cathedral is as follows:  

Countertenor (Gospel Pulpit) / Orchestra (Southern Crossing)m / Choir I (Main Altar) / Choir II (Choir) / Choir III (Northern Crossing)

Organ (Choir, in its two parts) / Choir IV (2 violins, Rose Window, West) / Choir V (French horn, Aisle, East)

Sound emanates and spreads from these distinctive places as if it were both echo and reverberation coming from the Cathedral itself as well as from all its past. The history of this temple seems to be transcending throughout the execution of Libro del frío. With regard to this, the presence of Mozarabic Antiphonary —an impressive gem that is preserved in this Cathedral— can be sensed in the score. The echo of the antiphony Memorare Domine, which is included in this codex, vibrates in several moments in the composition, in fact it is the direct link between our present and that sonorous past arising from a thousand years ago. Likewise, the remote whisper and echo of Tomás Luis de Victoria as well as those of other Spanish polyphonists are to be found in the deep fabric of this resonant building that in my work joins, once again, the notion of “book” as both praise and framework of the memory and writing in Western culture with the poetic and existential cold of Gamoneda’s poetry. Furthermore, the different instrument groups are placed in spatial constellations with profound meanings: the cardinal points, like in the architecture built in Ancient history and in other cultures, and also in Gothic cathedrals. Accordingly, wind instruments are set in the north, distant violins by the rose window in the west, a French horn in the eastern aisle, the main orchestra in the southern crossing, two string groups in the choir and on the main altar respectively, the countertenor’s voice in the Gospel pulpit, centred in relation with all the sonorous clusters and with the organ as a companion in the dialogues and both musical and spatial resonances. This whole cosmogony has multifarious implications in connection with the temple and the poetic world it turns into sound. The structure of Libro del frío is the following:

I. I am cold by water springs

II. Someone has walked into white memory

Interlude I

III. An elderly man stands before an empty path

IV. I loved all losses

Interlude II

V. You are no longer in your ears

VI. Cold of limits

VII. Music on the edge of abyss

Before drawing to an end, I shall mention another surprising fact. For many years, I spent periods of time working in various monasteries in the province of León. On many occasions, Libro del frío would rest on the table in my cell in Santa María de Carrizo. One day, my dear Sister Gema, who was Abbess then, was stupefied at reading the name of Antonio Gamoneda on my scores of Libro del frío that I had been composing, and told me —not without amazement on my behalf— that Gamoneda himself had stayed within those same walls about ten years before. When some time later I talked with Gamoneda of such a coincidence, to our wonder we found out that the writing of his own collection of poems Libro del frío began in that very Monastery. Thus, those times and spaces came together in a way I wouldn’t hesitate to call magic.      

This musical work is dedicated to the Cathedral of León International Organ Festival on its 25th anniversary; to Marta Martínez, Fernando Quiñones and Samuel Rubio (together with Adolfo Gutiérrez Viejo), who gave me their precious friendship and a wonderful space; to Antonio Gamoneda, whose words provided me with the most fruitful inspiration. Today I would like to heighten this dedication with the memory of our friend Fernando Quiñones, the very soul of this Festival and a fundamental as well as an unforgettable figure of numerous adventures and projects like this musical work, Libro del frío. 

Límina, for organ, concludes this CD; it, too, was composed for León Cathedral for the inauguration of its new organ (Orgelbau Klais Bonn) which took place in 2013. This musical work is a gift as my recognition of friendship and gratefulness for those who, within the Cathedral of León International Organ Festival, managed to have this new organ built, once again with my special acknowledgement to Marta, Fernando and Samuel. LÍMINA means “limits”, “thresholds”, and stands for a quest as well as for a poetic journey through those recesses to be found in the architecture and light which shroud the magic temple known as “La Pulchra Leonina”, that is “The Beautiful Leonese”.   

José M. Sánchez-Verdú

After Sánchez-Verdú

Nearly twenty years have gone by since the first time I listened to this musical work. I will not speak of the emotion I experienced on that day, nor will I disclose the piercing beauty stirred by Sánchez-Verdú. Yet, I am impelled to speak of other virtues which, at least for me, are to be found in this musical work.   

After listening to this composition, I believe I started to discern “other lights” being shed on the nature and functions of poetry and music, and on the relations between them as well as on the elements that are common to both. It shall be mentioned that when it comes to musical expertise, I have none at all, and as for philological sciences, my knowledge is rather scant. Nevertheless, here and now, I shall abridge and hazard notions and hypothesis in both fields. The incompetence and errors that will ensue are in no way to be associated with the stimulus produced by Sánchez-Verdú’s musical work: as a matter of fact, they will be exclusively the outcome of my lack of competence. Thus, I shall begin.

I know – almost everybody does – that in great historic and protohistoric cultures, poetry was not created nor was it understood as separate from music, in fact poetry and music were meant as one.

We also know that, in those tribes that nowadays are referred to as primitive, music used to be accompanied by dancing and by articulated phonation, which generally implies ludic or magic discourse.

Beyond the two clarifications I have just mentioned, I would like to highlight that “breastfed infants” are sensitive to and delighted for being sung to by their mothers, namely, they are made sensitive by a primary orality (ea, ea, ea) which stems from music.

The three previous paragraphs are evidently aimed at “certifying” clear, or I would even say universal instances of the oneness of music and poetry. In my view, it is convenient to make reference to what I call a sufficient cause, which conveys its cultural quality in the first two examples, and its neurosensitive nature in the third. It is not easy to do so, at least for me, but I will take on the challenge: as it is pleasure its sufficient cause. I do not deduce it nor do I induce it: indeed it exists and this is enough to me (see also Aristotle’s Poetics in relation with Tragedy).

With some degree of deliberation, I still have to put forward the circumstances and the causes that are at stake in the oneness of music and poetry. This is because I prefer to rely on the verified presence of rhythm as its endorsement. In fact, it is rhythm that makes aesthetic function real in any kind of phonation, and in a fundamental way it does so in both the musical sphere and in poetic orality. Written poetry cannot be overlooked, however – I hope Gutenberg will grant me this license – it is not different from the score that is used to play a musical piece.   

                

As for the true oneness and the both professional and discretionary separation underlying music and poetry, I will conclude with the “most powerful” and “most touching” reminder I can conveniently resort to, which is the following: perhaps what is disregarded at times is the fact that the nasciturus, that is the unborn child, feels his mother’s heartbeat (in fact her distinctive heartbeat). I cannot think of anything else that may spark a vocation, a habit or an aesthetic modulation with such will and power like hearing one’s mother’s heartbeat for over three or four million times. It may be mere chance that sensitive and vocational activity eventually conflates into poetry and music; indeed, it is a magnificent accident in its double possibility.   

Many are the suggestions hinting at the fact that music and poetry may be seen as simultaneous or connected, and that such notion entails a delightfully humanist perspective based on their indissoluble unity.

 

Antonio Gamoneda

También te recomendamos…

Productos relacionados