Falla in Britain

Musical Times, Summer 2003 by Collins, Chris

CHRIS COLLINS chronicles the Spanish master's five trips to the United Kingdom

To-night there will be much excitement among the ultra-artistic set and lovers of the Russian ballet generally. For a new ballet will be produced by the wonderful Massine [...] This is 'The Three-Cornered Hat,' with music by Manuel de Falla, the Spanish composer (who is a very clever falla indeed) [..]1

SUCH ENTHUSIASM filled many column inches in the days leading up to the world premiere of The three-cornered hat at the Alhambra Theatre on 22 July 1919. On 19 July, an article in The Daily Mail heralded the ballet as 'the first work on a large scale by the new national school of Spanish music to be heard in London', and attached to this a certain relevance:

There seem to be several analogies between the present state of Spanish music and of English music. Both schools produced noble and distinguished work in Renaissance music. Both were in rather low water in the greater part of the 18th and 19th centuries. Both countries now seem on the verge of a great musical revival.2

On 11 July, the Daily Chronicle announced the presence in London of a 'picturesque personality': 'the well-known Spanish composer, Manuel de Falla.'3 Over the next few days Falla was to find himself in the media spotlight that attended Diaghilev's company wherever it went, and he milked every opportunity to promote his art. He was especially keen to emphasise its newness. In one interview he made the following striking declarations:

Schubert and Mendelssohn no doubt spoke after their own hearts, but I cannot have it that the art of such men (or any) is to be a fixed norm in music. [...] Most nineteenth-century music is to be mistrusted, and as regards the classical symphonies and concertos the teacher's one duty is to utter warnings against them. [... ] How stimulating to think of the future! For music is just starting out on her way. Harmony is on the threshold.4

Such statements can have served only to gird the critics' loins for something uncompromisingly avant-garde. And when the first night arrived, this was precisely the impression that many of them received. The new Russian ballet at the Alhambra last night,' wrote one reviewer, 'is Spanish, futurist and 18th century. But, first of all, futurist.'5 The show was nothing short of incomprehensible to the critic of The Westminster Gazette, who considered Falla's score 'as eccentric and queer and freakish as the most avid modernist could wish'; he went on to describe Picasso's scenery as 'quite comically flat and feeble'.6

But most critics shared the judgement of the general public, and declared Falla's ballet an out-and-out triumph. 'ALHAMBRA DANCE SENSATION,' proclaimed a headline in the Daily Express the day after the premiere; 'SPECTATORS ELECTRIFIED BY THE "JOTA".'7 The reviewer for The Sporting Times recorded that 'the enthusiasm [...] defies description. It was tremendous. There is no other word.'8 'Olivette', The Evening News's 'Woman in London', confessed: 'I don't know how many "curtains" there were after "The Three-Cornered Hat" [...] Someone said fourteen, but I did not count. I was too busy clapping my hands till they tingled.'9

Sadly, Falla was not himself present on that Tuesday evening. The reason is well-known. News that his mother was seriously ill had reached him that afternoon; in fact, she had died that very day (though he did not discover this until he reached Spain a few days later). This was a cruel twist of fate. Falla had been in London since the end of June;10 now he was having to leave the city a matter of hours before the curtain rose. According to his biographer Jaime Pahissa, he was accompanied to the railway station by Diaghilev's entire company.11

His month-long stay in the city had not however been in vain. He had supervised rehearsals, and had even made last-minute alterations to the score. Notably, he reinstated at the beginning of the ballet a passage that he had earlier excised from Act 2;12 in its new position, it allowed the audience a few moments to admire Picasso's drop-curtain.

His stay in London reaped personal rewards too. Lacking English, he was attended in the city by several resident Spaniards, including Salvador de Madariaga, Lord Carisbrooke (brother of Queen Victoria Eugenie of Spain), and the poet and composer Pedro Morales (who, as the London representative of the Sociedad de Autores Espanoles, was effectively Falla's agent in Britain). He cemented friendships with Ernest Ansermet and Pablo Picasso, and made the acquaintance of many British musicians, several of whom he treated to a private play-through of the new ballet at the Savoy Hotel four days before the premiere.13 One of the English musicians he met was to become a lifelong friend: the composer and conductor Eugene Goossens.14

His accommodation in the city was arranged by Georges Jean-Aubry, the French music critic and one of the Spaniard's most devoted apologists. Falla spent the month as the guest of Aubry's 'meilleure amie' in London,15 the Swedish soprano Louise Alvar. The hospitality of Alvar and her businessman husband Charles Copeley Harding was well known among continental composers: Ravel and Malipiero were among those who stayed at their house at 14 Holland Park in Kensington.16