José Pablo Moncayo

José Pablo Moncayo García (Guadalajara, Jalisco, June 29, 1912-Mexico City, June 16, 1958) was a pianist, percussionist, music teacher, composer and orchestra director. Mexican. As a composer, José Pablo Moncayo represents one of the most important legacies of Mexican nationalism in music, along with Silvestre Revueltas, Carlos Chávez and Julián Carrillo. He produced some of the masterpieces that best symbolize the essence of national aspirations, as well as the contradictions in Mexico of the 20th century century; His best-known work, Huapango, for symphony orchestra, is a work inspired by the Veracruz sones that he studied during a visit to the port of Alvarado (together with Blas Galindo), Veracruz and that includes melodic and rhythmic motifs of several sones, among which are most evident "El Siquisiri", "El Balajú" and "El Gavilancito". Other works such as Sinfonietta, "Tierra de Temporal", "Cumbres" and "Forests" They represent the pinnacle of Mexican musical nationalism in the mid-20th century.

Biography

He was born in Guadalajara Jalisco, Mexico, on June 29, 1912 and died in Mexico City on June 16, 1958 at the age of 45, almost 2 weeks before his 46th birthday. He was a disciple of Carlos Chávez, Miguel Valdez, Eduardo Hernández Moncada, Candelario Huízar and Aaron Copland. He was the son of Francisco Moncayo Casillas and Juana García López. He studied piano with Eduardo Hernández Moncada and later entered the National Conservatory of Music in 1929. His teachers at this institution were Candelario Huízar and Carlos Chávez, of harmony and composition respectively. At this time he was forced to play as a pianist in cafes and radio stations to contribute to the family economy and to pay for his studies, until he joined the National Symphony Orchestra directed by Carlos Chávez as a percussionist.

He married Clara Elena Rodríguez del Campo, with whom he had two daughters: Claudia and Clara Elena. He also studied in 1942 with the composer Aaron Copland, thanks to a scholarship he won from the Berkshire Institute. One of Moncayo's first professional jobs was as a percussionist for the National Symphony Orchestra which he later directed from 1949 to 1954.

In 1927 he moved with his family to Mexico City, where he began his first piano lessons. In his youth he worked as a pianist in cafes and accompanied fashionable singers on radio stations, to help with family expenses and pay for his studies. In 1929 he entered the National Conservatory of Music where he learned from figures such as Candelario Huízar and Carlos Chávez; The latter got Moncayo the position of percussionist in the Mexican Symphony Orchestra in 1931. In 1935 he formed his first classical music ensemble called Group of Four, with Blas Galindo, Salvador Contreras and Daniel Ayala Pérez to spread his works which They reflect the nationalist spirit of Mexico, becoming a success at a national and international level, notably in South American countries.

By 1949 he had already established himself as one of the most relevant musicians in Mexico. That year he was named conductor of the Conservatory Symphony Orchestra, which later changed its name to the National Symphony Orchestra.

First years at the National Conservatory of Music

José Pablo Moncayo was introduced to music by his older brother, Francisco. Eduardo Hernández Moncada is considered Moncayo's first teacher, when the latter was barely fourteen years old. According to Aurelio Tello, Hernández Moncada suggested his student that he studied at the National Conservatory of Music (Mexico). Tello also says that Moncayo was admitted to the Conservatory in 1929; Meanwhile, in order to pay for his studies, he worked as a jazz pianist. According to Torres Chibrás' research, several sources indicate that Moncayo took musical composition lessons with Candelario Huízar, and it is known that he continued his piano training with Hernández Moncada. Although it is not known with certainty which courses Moncayo took at the National Conservatory, nor who his teachers were, thanks to the biographies of his contemporaries, Salvador Contreras, Blas Galindo and Daniel Ayala Pérez, we can assume that he followed a path similar to them in their musical training. It is known that Huízar taught courses such as Harmony, Counterpoint and Musical Forms. The Solfeggio course, –reading of sheet music–, was taught by the eminent teachers Vicente Teódulo Mendoza and Gerónimo Baqueiro Foster. Luis Sandi was the director of the choir at the Conservatory and Eduardo Hernández Moncada, assistant director. In different periods, Hernández Moncada taught, apart from his piano lessons, Harmony and Solfeggio. José Rolón, who had studied in Paris under the instruction of Nadia Boulanger and Paul Dukas (he also met Arnold Schönberg), taught Harmony, Counterpoint and Fugue. Carlos Chávez, who was not only interested in musical training, but also in culture and general education of Conservatory students, established Literature courses, taught by contemporary poets Salvador Novo and Carlos Pellicer Cámara; of Universal History, taught by Jesús C. Romero, as well as History of Mexican Culture, taught by Chávez himself.

According to Salvador Contreras, Carlos Chávez created a Composition course at the National Conservatory. Although Roberto García Morillo indicates the year 1930, most sources indicate that this course began in 1931. According to Robert L. Parker, this Composition course was initially called “Musical Creation Class” and, later, “Composition Workshop”; Some of Chávez's colleagues were also his students, such as Vicente T. Mendoza, Candelario Huízar and, it is said, although briefly, Silvestre Revueltas, as well as “there were four students who were less than twenty years old: Daniel Ayala Pérez and Blas Galindo (both of indigenous origin), Salvador Contreras and José Pablo Moncayo." Jesús C. Romero points out that Chávez carried out a selection process before admitting any student, and mentions that Daniel Ayala was chosen thanks to his "incipient renown as a composer, Salvador Contreras for his ability to play the violin, and José Pablo Moncayo, for his ability to interpret scores at first sight on the piano." In addition, Romero indicates that Blas Galindo, along with five other students, was also admitted. Apparently, the new course attracted many students – which increased year after year – although in the end only four took the final test. These four students were Moncayo, Salvador Contreras, Blas Galindo and Ayala. An article written by Galindo confirms that he was admitted to the course in 1932, along with seven other students. This article offers a detailed description of the training received in this workshop.

Death

Moncayo died on June 16, 1958 in Mexico City. Initially buried in the Spanish Pantheon, on November 22, 2012 his remains were transferred to the Rotunda of Illustrious Persons where they currently rest.

Musical legacy

Although Moncayo's composition was his greatest contribution to Mexican music, his career as a conductor was also of great importance although it lasted less than ten years (1944 - 1954). As a conductor, his promising career was hampered by a difficult cultural environment, adverse political situations, and an early death. His work has been the subject of little academic research. According to Torres Chibrás, Moncayo's career as a director has not been studied in depth, either by national or foreign researchers. José Antonio Alcaraz, musicologist and renowned Mexican music critic, assures: “Mexican nationalism comprises a period whose chronological limits can, for the purposes of its study, be traced with some precision in 1928: the year of the founding of the Mexican Symphony Orchestra., and ending three decades later, in 1958, with the death of José Pablo Moncayo (...)”.; although this notion refers exclusively to post-revolutionary nationalism, and excludes, for example, the Mexican musical nationalisms of the 19th century.

Moncayo's death coincides with the decline of the Mexican nationalist movement, which was a result of the fall of the ideals of the Mexican Revolution. Yolanda Moreno Rivas concludes: “Moncayo's death in 1958 decisively marked the end of the school of nationalist composition. In the same way that his work, without his followers, surpassed and abolished the innocent use of the Mexican theme, his death ended the preponderance of a style of composition, whose imprint marked musical creation in Mexico for more than three years. decades; although only at the beginning of the 60's would it be possible to speak of the definitive abandonment of the great Mexican Fresco, of the forgetting of the epic tone and of the search for new structural factors in the composition.

Moncayo's most famous work remains his colorful piece for orchestra, Huapango, but his output also includes lesser-known but high-quality pieces. Among them we can consider Amatzinac, for flute and string quartet (1935); his Symphony (1944); Sinfonietta (1945); Homage to Cervantes for two oboes and string orchestra (1947); his opera La mulata de Córdoba (1948); Tierra de Temporal (1949); Green Walls for piano (1951); Bosques (1954) and the ballet Tierra (1958).

Works in chronological order