Hola amigos,

Cómo ya sabéis, soy un estudiante de 6º de grado profesional de Piano y con estas líneas quiero presentaros un ciclo de conciertos a beneficio de los Comedores Sociales de Madrid que estoy intentando organizar.

La idea surgió de una conversación con mi madre, Georgina García-Mauriño, sobre cómo la crisis estaba afectando ya a tantos niños cerca de nosotros. Las noticias sobre el extraordinario trabajo de los comedores sociales llamaba nuestra atención especialmente, dejándonos entre sobrecogidos y admirados. ¿En qué manera podríamos ayudar con nuestra música?

Entre los dos se nos ocurrió esta propuesta: una temporada de recitales para todos los públicos, con la presentación de una obra y su compositor de forma amena, resaltando especialmente los valores de la biografía de cada autor. Enseguida imaginamos un programa para un primer recital sobre Beethoven, que finalmente se llevará a cabo gracias al interés y la generosidad mostrados por La Favorita, un restaurante en el corazón del madrileño barrio de Chamberí y sede de la Fundación Operística de Navarra.

Inicialmente acordamos que los conciertos tuvieran una regularidad mensual, y decidimos las fechas de los tres primeros: el sábado 20 de octubre, a las 12’30, Junto al piano con BEETHOVEN; el sábado 17 de noviembre, a las 12’30, Junto al piano con MOZART, el sábado 15 de diciembre, a las 12’30, Junto al piano con J.S.BACH.

De momento cuento sólo conmigo y con la gran ayuda de mi madre para poner en marcha este ciclo, pero en realidad me gustaría atraer a otros estudiantes de 5º y 6º de diferentes conservatorios profesionales de la Comunidad de Madrid, para terminar de diseñar estos programas y dar continuidad al proyecto. Pienso que ésta puede ser una oportunidad de aportar nuestro talento en apoyo de nuestros conciudadanos en dificultades, con todas las ventajas que una experiencia así puede suponer. De hecho, ya tengo una muy buena amiga violinista que ha accedido a tocar conmigo en el Primer Recital. He preparado este cartel para animar a mis compañeros, y ya lo he colgado en el tablón del conservatorio:

El Primer Recital estaría compuesto por la Sonata "Patética", para Piano, y por el primer movimiento de la sonata "Primavera", para Violín y Piano, todo ello compuesto por Beethoven. De lo último os dejo aquí una excelente grabación por Menuhin y Kempff.

Un abrazo,
Manu

Hi guys,

It has been a long August month, but I have certainly enjoyed it and you can bet it had a lot of music too... I spent nearly the hole month in the little village of Ezcaray, up in La Rioja, Spain. The food was, as always, delicious and I had a great time playing chess all afternoons.

I must bring some music now... Well, as a matter of fact, I had a video some wonderful music when I was a little boy (oh, about five, six years old), a VHS which was in fact "Peter and the Wolf" by Prokofiev, narrated by the singer Sting... But the rest of the VHS was the story of Peter after "Peter and the Wolf"... To make it short, Peter escaped his home at night and went to a little house down a road where he met all the famous musicians of History, like Mozart or Haydn... All this story was non-talked and illustrated with music by Prokofiev... I loved the second part more than the first, but the little inconvenience of the VHS was that it didn't tell me what were the other tracks, rather than "Peter and the Wolf"...

One day this summer I went to Ezcaray's Public Library, and there I came across a CD which had the same cover as my old VHS... Well, I brought it home and, in fact, the music I just told you about was in the CD. You can imagine how happy I was after making this discovery. Memories from my childhood came back to my head. But wait a minute... I haven't told you what the brilliant music was!!!... It was Prokofiev's "Classical" Symphony and Prokofiev's Overture from Hebrew Themes. I strongly recommend you to watch the following videos as the works of music are simply wonderful, magnificent I may say...

I hope you have enjoyed them and I strongly recommend that, if you have kids, you show them these marvelous works...

See you,

Manu

Hi guys,

I have been studying these last few days, for the conservatory, the Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven in C# minor and Chopin's Study no. 1 in C Major.

It still astonishes me, five weeks later I have started studying it, how the Moonlight Sonata is such a dark and sad sonata. I think that Beethoven was trying to explore the lower sounds of the Piano and created a great movement, which sounds like an improvisation (as the title "Sonata quasi una Fantasia" suggests), with the left hand as a "basso continuo" proper to Bach's time and the right hand creating the melody with, at the same, time the broken chords which accompany the melody and the "basso". The right hand's ascensions create a tension, rapidly removed by the following descensions. I think that Beethoven searches the essential language of sadness for the loss of something very dear to him.

Chopin was a great pianist and composer, everybody knows that. But he was also a great piano teacher. The studies are the perfect example of what Chopin wanted his pupils to do to aquire perfect technique. In the first one of the Opus 10, he composes a succesion of arpeggios up and down the keyboard with the right hand and the melody on the low and dark chords of the left hand. In the fourth in C# minor, Chopin composes a melody in the right hand and the left hand repeats it trying, in some sort of way, to "reach" the right hand. The rythm in both of these studies is very fast, nearly diabolic.

Well, what did you think? I hope you have liked it.
Oops, time to go... In Spain we eat at nine.
See you,
MANU

Hi guys,
I have been busy these last few days because I am preparing my Audition of the "Pathétique" Sonata by Beethoven. But, yesterday, my friends and I had a great time setting the Nativity Scene and singing carols around the piano at home.

At a special spot of the house, Luis Moure's sculpture "Nativity" was already awaiting...

But, before that, in the morning, we had taken the blue box from the top shelf of the corridor's cupboard as in the book "Merry Cristmas with JOAQUÍN RODRIGO".

Of course, we sang traditional spanish carols...

We also sang carols like "Jingle Bells", "Adeste Fideles", "Holy Night" or "Hark! the Herald Angels sing"...

So MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU ALL!!!

Dear Friends:

We are glad to announce our Mirlo Music - Tell Me An Opera VI Contest of Music Illustration. This year we propose to illustrate two different pieces of music:

- For children 5 to 8 years old. At mirlomusic.com or at tellmeanopera.com, you will find a beautiful Christmas carol from the Spanish composer Joaquín Rodrigo, “Pastorcito santo”, in English “Holly Shepherd boy”. There you can read the lyrics which were written by a very important Spanish writer, Lope de Vega, as you listen to the music. And if you like it, Why not take a pencil a make an illustration?

- For children 9 to 12 years old. At mirlomusic.com or at tellmeanopera.com, you will find Liszt’s Consolation nº 3, which is the third of a group of piano pieces that this wonderful composer wrote from some poems. There you can read some information on Liszt’s life as this year we are celebrating the bicentenary of his birth. If you like this piano piece, we encourage you to make an illustration based on your own feelings.

This is the first year our contest is announced in English so we are very excited and looking forward to receive the works of many international participants. So if you are ready to participate, you will find all the information at:

www.tellmeanopera.com

Hope you'll like our proposal. See you soon!!!!

Mirlo & Manu