3 Sonatas (107, 108, 112)

Manuel Blasco de Nebra was born into a musical Seville family in 1750, the son of the organist of the Cathedral, José Blasco de Nebra. At an early age he left his hometown Seville to go to Madrid where, supported by his uncle, the composer of zarzuelas José de Nebra, he tried to make a name as an organist, harpsichordist and pianist. He soon gained a reputation for his exceptional sight-reading, but due to his uncles death and the resulting lack of financial aid, had to return to Seville. There he found work as his father‘s assistant in the cathedral and later took his position as organist. Up until his death in 1784 Blasco de Nebra is said to have composed about 170 works, of which only 26 sonatas and six pastorellas have been rediscovered to the present day.

The new lease of life for Blasco de Nebra‘s works began in 1963, initiated by the American composer and professor Robert Parris, who, supported by the Library of Congress in Washington, was able to publish six sonatas that are considered to be later works of Blasco de Nebra. These works go back to a copy of a published edition that was printed in the 1780’s in Madrid. Since then, more of his works have been found in the Spanish abbeys of Osuna, Montserrat and Santa Clara. The three Sonatas that have been transcribed for guitar for the first time in the present book go back to the discoveries made in the abbey of “Osuna Encarnacion” situated east of Seville, and are seen as early works of Blasco de Nebra. One can still feel a close relation in style and form to sonatas from the baroque era composed on the Iberian Peninsula by, for example, Domenico Scarlatti, Carlos Seixas and Antonio Soler. With Blasco de Nebra these baroque traditions diminish in time, this can be seen for instance when comparing the sonatas discovered by Parris with the ones found in Osuna; the works of Blasco de Nebra move towards the classical multi-movement sonata form.

Transcribing the sonatas 107, 108 and 112 I have tried to remain as close as possible to the original keyboard version. The chosen solutions are always the ones closest to a harpsichord’s effects, this has it’s results especially in fingerings and the notated ornaments. All in all the music of Blasco de Nebra can be transferred to the guitar convincingly, in almost all cases idiomatic solutions can be found. As a result it was possible to keep all the original keys of the sonatas, which sees sonata 107 with the sixth string tuned to D, and 112 with a capo on the third fret. Ornamentations, that in frequency and accents are to be understood in the sense of the baroque can be played with a left hand slur most of the time, with trills one should consider playing over two strings. Broken chords, as in Sonata 108 measure 46 f., are understood in the classical style, with the beat on the melody. The grace notes that have been written in semiquavers, measures 43-45 and 50-52 (also Sonata 108) can be played as slurs or glissandi in the left hand.

I would like to say a warm thank you to Sylvain Lemay, Yuval Dvoran, Roberto Aussel and Martina Kollross, whose support made it possible to publish this wonderful music.

Daniel Marx, Dorfen 2015