Regino Sainz de la Maza

Part 1 Paris and Henri Collet

Allan Clive Jones

Note: These two articles were published in Classical Guitar in August 2000 (pages 20-24)

and September 2000 (pages 50-53), when Rodrigos Toccata and Henri Collets Briviesca

were unknown. Both pieces are mentioned in Part 2. In the versions of the articles

published in 2000 I referred to these works as unknown, and possibly lost. Both pieces

were rediscovered after these articles were first published. In March 2015 I revised the

articles to take account of the fact that both pieces were now available.

Although Regino Sainz de la Maza (18961981) enjoys an honoured place in musical

history as the dedicatee and first performer of Rodrigos Concierto de Aranjuez, to most

guitarists he remains a somewhat shadowy figure at least in the UK. In these two articles I

hope to offer some glimpses into the early career of this remarkable musician by looking at

some reviews dating from the 1920s, and at a substantial piece of journalism written by him

in the early 1930s. I do not pretend my two articles will bring Sainz de la Maza out of the

shade and into the full blaze of daylight, but some of the material will, I hope, cast new light

on him. At the very least, I think there are some surprises in store.

Much of my material in this first article is drawn from the French weekly musical magazine

Le Mnestrel, and in particular from the writings of Henri Collet, one of the magazines

regular contributors. Collet turns out to be an interesting figure in his own right, and I shall

say a little about him in due course.

Beginnings, and Paris debut

Sainz de la Maza was born in Burgos in 1896, and initially studied the piano. A move to

Madrid brought him into the orbit of Daniel Fortea, with whom he studied the guitar. He

also pursued composition with the composer and writer Jaime Pahissa in Barcelona. Almost

inevitably, the young Sainz de la Maza found his way to Paris, which in the early part of the

twentieth century was the leading musical capital in Europe, and a long-standing alma

mater for innumerable Spanish musicians. Many of them studied in Paris or sought to

establish their careers there.

The first reference I have found to Sainz de la Maza playing in Paris is a review of a concert

he gave on 18 February 1925, a mere nine months after Segovias debut in the same city.1

Sainz de la Maza did not create as big a stir as Segovia had it would be hard to imagine

how anyone could but he was certainly well received, as the frequent linking of his name

with those of Llobet, Pujol and Segovia shows. The following review, by Henri Collet in Le

Mnestrel, gives a flavour:2

PART 1 1

After Segovia, after Llobet, after Pujol, after Fabian, here is Sainz de la Maza, the

Castillian guitarist from Burgos, the bard of the solemn and meditative meseta [the vast

and sparsely populated Castillian plateau]. His concert at the Salle Pleyel was an

enchantment. In the same repertoire as Segovia, he managed to remain true to himself

through the refined, elegant, subtle and pure style of his playing. It is enough,

moreover, to study the slender fingers, responsive and supple, of Sainz to guess what

his style will be [...]

[Sainz de la Maza] is, first and foremost, a musician. His nostalgic and profound

compositions, harmonically rich, prove to us that he can become one of the rare

poets of the guitar. And his transcription of the Barca of Mompou is a complete

success. The large audience took an exceptional interest in this display, and gave

Sainz de la Maza a warm welcome.

Unfortunately it is not clear from Collets review what Sainz de la Maza played at this

concert, but a review in another journal supplies the missing information.3 The programme

included a Gavotte, Menuet, and Bourre by de Vise, a couple of Pavans by Milan, a

Sarabande by Handel, a Loure by J S Bach, the Homenaje by Falla, Torrobas Sonatine

(recently composed for Segovia, of course), and some Sor and Albeniz. Clearly the

programme was as Segovian as Collet says.

There were, however, a couple of interesting departures from the Segovian template,

namely Sainz de la Mazas own Zambra Gitana and the arrangement of Mompous Barca

which Collet refers to.4 By the early 1930s, we shall find the gap between Sainz de la

Mazas programmes and Segovias has starting to widen, principally because of Sainz de la

Mazas adoption of certain contemporary composers whom Segovia did not cultivate.

Return to Paris

In late 1926, almost two years after his debut in the city, Sainz de la Maza was back in Paris

to perform again. If the Paris public had been sated with the guitar by the time of his return,

it would surely have been no surprise, for the indefatigable Segovia had managed to squeeze

in at least nine performances in Paris by this date.5 The reviewer Henri Collets appetite, at

any rate, was not blunted:6

We have had Segovia. And now we have another incomparable guitarist, this time

Castillian, Sainz de la Maza. A pure artist, in the line of Sor and Tarrega; and, what is

more, a distinguished composer for his instrument, of which the infinite resources for

polyphony he knows to perfection.

Furthermore, his Salle Erard concert drew all the dilettanti. And justly so. The dignity,

aristocratic nobility, the concentrated fervour, the persuasive power all make Sainz de

la Maza the ideal interpreter of Castillian music. [....]

Collet then goes on to mention Sainz de la Mazas playing of a Bach Bourre and

Sarabande and then returns to the Spanish, or Spanish-influenced, part of the programme:

PART 1 2

In the works of Sor, Sainz was admirable. He was able, moreover, to convey all the

fantasy of Samazeuilhs Serenade, and I am infinitely grateful for his colourful

transcription of my Bolero.

It was with his own works that he concluded his fine programme. And all his listeners

loved his melodic and harmonic style, the subtle modulating iridescences of his

Cantilena, of the Chanson Populaire de Burgos, of the lively Andaluza and of the

prestigious Zambra.

[...] Lets hope that in Germany, where he is heading, he will be triumphant!

The programming of Samazeuilhs Serenade, composed for Segovia the preceding year,7

shows a further overlap between the programmes of the two guitarists. Indeed, according to

Collet, by early 1929 Sainz de la Maza was performing music by Segovias beloved Ponce

though which piece is not specified.

But in my view the most surprising feature of the concert reviewed here is the inclusion of a

piece by the reviewer himself, Henri Collet, albeit in transcription. It suggests that Collet is

someone who merits a closer look.

Henri Collet

In so far as Henri Collet (18851951) is remembered now in the UK, it tends to be for a

perceptive piece of musical journalism. In a survey of up-and-coming French composers of

the immediate post First World War period, he grouped six promising, but otherwise

unconnected, composers and dubbed them Les Six. The tag has stuck, even though only

three of them are performed with any frequency nowadays: Poulenc, Milhaud and

Honegger.8

Henri Collet. Picture by kind permission of Mme M.-T. Clostre-Collet.

Collets real passion, however, was not French music, but Spanish. He lived in Spain for a

time during his youth, and soaked up Spanish culture. All varieties of Spanish music

appealed to him, from vihuela to zarzuela, from Victoria to flamenco. He wrote a fine book

on Albeniz and Granados, both of whom were friends of his as were numerous other

Spanish musicians such as Casals, Segovia, Turina, Falla, Ricardo Vies and, of course,

Sainz de la Maza.

PART 1 3

Collet did what he could to further the careers of these Spanish musicians in Paris. Indeed,

for many years he contributed an Espagne column to Le Mnestrel in which he

summarised notable events on the Spanish musical scene, and reported the activities of its

leading lights. (Other contributors supplied similar columns devoted to music in Britain, the

USA, Germany, etc.)

Henri Collet was also a composer, and in his large catalogue are piano pieces, songs,

chamber music, operas, and orchestral music. The Spanish influence is very evident in much

of this music, for instance the Danzas Castellanas (1923) or the Danses Espagnoles (1936)

for piano. There is even an orchestral Symphonie de lAlhambra and two Flamenco

concertos, one for violin and one for piano.9 He also composed a piece for Segovia, which I

will say more about in Part 2.

Collets Bolero, which Sainz de la Maza transcribed and performed in his late-1926 concert,

was almost certainly no. 4 of Collets second set of Chants de Castille (1921), opp. 6266

for piano. At about two minutes long, it would hardly have occupied a large slice of the

programme, but Collet clearly appreciated the gesture.

London and eslewhere

Whether Sainz de la Mazas progress from Paris to Germany in late 1926/early 1927 was

triumphal, as Collet hoped, is not reported. Certainly Sainz de la Mazas London

appearance 18 months later (14 June 1928) at the Aeolian Hall was only partly successful, if

the Timess reviewer is to be believed:

He is technically very proficient, though the variety of tone he produces is limited, and

its volume rather too small for a concert hall. His programme consisted of Spanish

music with two pieces by Bach and Handel. Two movements from a Grande Sonate by

Sors [sic] were the most ambitious things in the programme. But they were musically

undistinguished, as also were some variations on a theme of Mozarts by the same

composer, and they needed far more brilliance in their performance to make them

interesting. The more modern pieces, for instance a Fandanguillo by Turina, proved a

good deal more attractive.10

No doubt Sainz de la Maza was overshadowed in London, as he had been in Paris, by

Segovia, who had already given six concerts there by the time Sainz de la Maza appeared

the most recent Segovia concert being a month before the concert reviewed above.11

Although I have not found any other reviews by Collet of Sainz de la Mazas performances

in Paris, snippets of news concerning Sainz de la Maza continued to appear occasionally in

Collets Espagne column. January 1929 finds Sainz de la Maza performing in Madrid, and

again in December 1931. In the autumn of 1934 he is in the USA, as is Segovia.12

Despite the paucity of information given in these short notices, it is clear that Sainz de la

Maza, while maintaining a Segovian core to his repertoire, was cultivating a more

adventurous line of contemporary composers. Which composers he cultivated will become

apparent in my next article, which will look at a substantial piece of journalism by Sainz de

la Maza.

PART 1 4

Acknowledgement

For much of the information in this article relating to the life and work of Henri Collet, I am

greatly indebted to Collets daughter Mme M.-T. Clostre-Collet.

Notes

PART 1 5

1 I take Sainz de la Mazas concert on 18 February 1925 to have been his Paris debut. The reviews that I quote

in this article certainly speak of the event as though it were a debut. Segovias Parisian debut was on 7 April 1924. My

series of articles The Judgement of Paris (Classical Guitar, AprilDecember 1998) looked at Segovias the early

Parisian appearances.

2 Le Mnestrel, 6 March 1925, p. 117. This review, and all the others translated from French, carry a health

warning: my French falls a good deal short of virtuoso level.

3Le Monde Musical, February 1925, p 69. The reviewer was Marc Pincherle, a Segovia devotee and the editor of the

Le Monde Musical around this time.

4 The Barca is presumably La Barca from Mompous Impressions ntimes for piano.

5 Segovia had played in Paris on: 7 April 1924 (debut), 7 May 1924, 28 June 1924 (?uncertain), 6 May 1925,

13 May 1925, 28 December 1925, 16 January 1926, 23 January 1926, 2 June 1926, and 18 November 1926.

6 Le Mnestrel 10 December, 1926, p 529.

7 A short item in Le Courrier Musical, 15 October 1925, p. 488, dates the composition of Samazeuilhs

Serenade to the summer (or possibly late spring) of 1925. It was premiered by Segovia in Paris on 16 January 1926

(Le Mnestrel, 22 Jan 1926 p. 41).

8 Collets two articles on Les Six appeared in Comoedia, 16 and 23 January 1920. The other three composers

were Germaine Tailleferre, Georges Auric and Leon Durey.

9 The Symphony and the two Flamenco Concertos are recorded on Claves CD 50-9801.

10 The Times, 16 June 1928, p. 12.

11 Segovia had performed in London on at least these dates: 7 December 1926, 29 January 1927, 18 May 1927,

31 May 1927, 29 October 1927, 11 May 1928.

12 Among the interesting snippets that Collet gives is a note in Le Mnestrel dated 15 February 1935, p. 58,

reporting the enthusiastic reception Bachs Chaconne, as performed by Segovia, has received in Spain. Clearly the

usually cited date and place for the premiere of this arrangement, 4 June 1935 in Paris, is incorrect.

Regino Sainz de la Maza

Part 2: Journalism and new music

Allan Clive Jones

In my second article about the guitarist and composer Sainz de la Maza I want to look at a

sample of his musical journalism and, briefly, at the evidence for some of the contemporary

composers he performed.

For some time Sainz de la Maza was a music critic for the Spanish daily newspaper A.B.C.

This newspaper continues publication to this day, and is known for its liberal slant and for

its cultural coverage. In former times it was identified with a somewhat pro-monarchist and

then pro-Franco stance. The sample I shall look at in this article, however, is drawn not

from A.B.C. but from El Imparcial. Adorned with a cartoon of its author, Sainz de la

Mazas article was printed on Tuesday 21 March 1933 and was a contribution to the series

Los Artistas y su Arte. The following translation was made by Sean Scrivener, to whom I

am extremely grateful. Sean also provided the clarifications shown in square brackets.

El Imparcial, 21 March 1933

Artists and their art

By Regino Saz de la Mata [sic]

The guitar cannot be compared with any other instrument. Its sound is a unique sound, a

deep and faraway sound, as Stravinsky put it, completely different from any other. Its

quality of sound, the product of six very different timbres in its six strings, is instrumental

and they give it unmatched powers of expression.

A stubbornly held prejudice has had us believe for a long time that the guitar was unable

to respond as an instrument to the demands of todays musicians; and, with a false idea

of what progress is, it was believed that, like the spinet and the lute, it had been forever

displaced by the arrival on the musical scene of the pianoforte, with the latters volume

of sound and all its modes of expression. According to this view, the guitar could be

relegated to the realms of archaeology, back in the world of prehistory and legend along

with the Assyrian tamboura or the Egyptian eoud from which, according to its mythology,

it originated. The guitar remained popular: [so] a glib literature put about, without any

knowledge or sense of tradition, that it was decadent. It took as a symptom of its demise

that gipsy picturesqueness and that awful flamenco-ism which have detracted from its

purest essence, as created by the genius of a people. The guitar, because of its glorious

tradition, because of its origin, because of its part in the development of European

music, its ability to adapt to the most diverse means of musical expression, could not

disappear, even though it had its crises, its periods of decadence, just as it had its

periods of highest grandeur.

There is no point in arguing about the supposed superiority of some instruments over

others. Their worlds of sound, their souls, are not interchangeable. The same arguments

PART 2 1

rage about modern and old music. Wanda Landowska puts it very well: Bachs

Christmas Oratorio cannot be surpassed. A small piece by Couperin cannot be

surpassed. Bach tried with the Suites Franaises and created, nevertheless, new

beauty.

Since the time that the Latin guitar, as we now know it, was used in the short pieces in

Alfonso the Wises Cantigas, every century has left its mark and the stamp of so many

brilliant minds on this instrument.

There is, in particular, that extensive period of the Spanish Renaissance, which the most

distinguished musicologists have studied in depth: Gevaert, Fetis, Mitjana, Soubies,

Chavarri, Pedrell, Salazar, Trem, Father Villalba, Agejas, Torner and so many others all

agree on the decisive influence which those magnificent guitar composers of the

Sixteenth Century had on the development of musical forms.

Today, the guitar is expanding [its repertoire] and achieving splendid new heights. Its

technique is starting to become systematically ordered, with a high pedagogical sense

[i.e. increased scope for teaching and learning], and it is broadening its register with

effects of sonority and polyphony hitherto unknown.

Stravinsky, Schnberg and Hindemith incorporate it into some of their orchestral

arrangements, something which had its first precedent in Monteverdi, who brought two

guitars into his orchestra for his opera Orfeo, sung in the court of Mantua in 1607.

Its repertoire is steadily being enriched by contemporary musicians of all nationalities

and all schools: De Falla showed first, with his Homage to Debussy, that the guitar was

capable of high artistic attainment; and Turina, Salazar, Torroba, Chavarri, Rodrigo,

Bautista, Pittaluga, Bacarisse, Halffter, Antonio Jos, Palau, Ponce, Villalobos,

Tansmann, Samazeuilh, Collet, Migot and several others have all followed his example.

* * *

From our vantage point over 80 years after Sainz de la Mazas article appeared, one

naturally raises an eyebrow at one or two of the authors more dubious claims, such as his

apparent annexing of the viheulists into the guitarists camp (in the fifth paragraph). But on

the whole, the most striking feature is how little there is to take issue with, and how

contemporary the article appears to modern eyes.

Take for instance, Sainz de la Mazas attitude to early music and instruments. His

scepticism about the notion of musical progress as applied to instruments, although not

unique to him at the time, is nevertheless in sharp contrast to the opinion of, say, Segovia,

who held the lute in contempt.1 Although Sainz de la Maza and Segovia were only a few

years apart, on this issue they seem almost to belong to different generations.

I am also struck by Sainz de la Mazas taut writing style, refreshingly free of that windy

rhapsodising that blights so much writing about the guitar. Of course, we dont know how

much the article was changed between writing and publication, but on the evidence here

Sainz de la Maza appears to have been an accomplished writer.

PART 2 2

In addition to the style, one is struck by the clear sense of purpose that informs the article

from start to finish. Many writers (and no doubt some composers) would say that the

hardest part of their craft is organisation: the eternal problem of arranging ideas in a way

that has shape and direction. On the evidence of this piece I am tempted to borrow a

description applied to another guitarist/journalist, Hector Berioz a born writer according

to his biographer David Cairns.2

Composers

Among the composers listed in Sainz de la Mazas final paragraph are several names made

familiar by their association with Segovia, namely Turina, Torroba, Ponce and Tansman.

The other names, Salazar, Chavarri, Bautista, Pittaluga, Bacarisse, Halffter, Jos, Palau,

Collet and Migot, are not associated with Segovia, although some of them certainly

composed for him, and Rodrigo and Villa Lobos were only taken up by Segovia some time

after the appearance of this article.

The interesting question arises of whether Sainz de la Maza featured any of these non-

Segovian composers in his own programmes. Thanks to the writings of the French

composer and critic Henri Collet, whom I mentioned in my first article and who features in

Sainz de la Mazas list of composers, a tentative answer can be given. Collet reports that in

January 1929 in Madrid, Sainz de la Maza performed a programme which included

besides the expected names of Bach, Sor, Tarrega, Torroba, etc. pieces by Beovides and

Villa Lobos.3 Three years later, in December 1931, again in Madrid, Sainz de la Maza

included music by Bautista and Rodolfo Halffter in his programme, as well as his own

Alegria.4 And in November 1934 he performed at least one movement of Joss Sonata.

Joss Sonata, which has only recently become well known, was completed in August 1933,

about five months after the appearance of Sainz de la Mazas article. In citing Jos as a

composer for the guitar, Sainz de la Maza was presumably thinking of Joss Pavana Triste,

an earlier guitar piece that was later incorporated into the Sonata.

Collet and Rodrigo

Two of the composers mentioned by Sainz de la Maza particularly deserve our attention:

Henri Collet, who featured heavily in my last article, and Rodrigo, because of the famous

Concierto de Aranjuez which he would write for Sainz de la Maza in 1939, six years after

the appearance of the above article.

As we saw last month, Sainz de la Maza performed a transcription of Henrie Collets piano

piece Bolero at a concert in Paris in 1926. Somewhat before this event, Collet had provided

Segovia with a piece, almost certainly at Segovias request. This piece was believed to be

lost as no guitar piece survived in Collets papers. However, in May 2001 a manuscript of

Collets Briviesca: Poema para Guitarra was found among Segovias papers by Angelo

Gilardino. The same piece, in a version for solo piano, had been published by Salabert in

1921. It is therefore probable that Collet adapted his own piano piece for the guitar and

presented it to Segovia. The guitar version has been published by Brben in the Segovia

Archive series. So far I have found no evidence of Sainz de la Maza performing this piece.

PART 2 3

Rodrigos Toccata

The Rodrigo piece alluded to in Sainze de la Mazas article is likely to have been the

Zarabanda Lejana of 1926. In August 1933, five months after the publication of Sainz de la

Mazas article, Rodrigo composed what appears to be his second guitar piece, the Toccata.

This piece was unknown until 2005 when it was found in Sainz de la Mazas archive,

although a few allusions to it were made during the 1930s.5 Possibly the earliest allusion

comes from a short item published in Le Monde Musical in October 1933. In that month the

journal published the responses of various composers to the question of what they had been

working on during the summer. Rodrigo supplied the following.

First of all, I wrote a Toccata for guitar which my friend Sainz de la Magda [sic] will

perform during his South American tour. Currently, I am harmonising Three Valencian

Popular Songs for mixed voices, after which I want to finish my Three Pieces for Piano.

Sainz de la Maza appears not to have performed the piece, which is formidably difficult.

The composer reworked it as the first movement of his first movement of his violin concert

Concierto de esto.

The names of Sainz de la Maza and Rodrigo are, of course, inextricably linked because of

the Concierto de Aranjuez, which Sainz de la Maza premiered in November 1940.

However, as I hope these two articles have suggested, there are many reasons aside from

the concerto for celebrating his achievements.

Acknowledgement

I am extremely grateful to Sean Scrivener for permission to use his translation of Sainz de la

Mazas article, and to Mme M.-T. Clostre-Collet for information concerning her father

Henri Collet.

PART 2 4

Notes

PART 2 5

1 See John Duarte, Andres, Segovia as I Knew Him, Mel Bay, 1998, p.34. Segovias attitude to the lute did not

extend to the music composed for it, much of which he admired.

2 Cairns makes this comment in his introduction to C. R. Fortescues translation of Hector Berliozs Les

Soires de lorchestre, published as Evenings in the Orchestra, Penguin, 1963, on p. 15.

3 Le Mnestrel, 25 Jan 1929, p. 41.

4 Le Mnestrel, 25 December 1931 p 554.

5 Wade, Graham, Joaquin Rodriogo, A Life in Music: Travelling to Aranjuez, 19011939, GRM Publications,

2006, p. 164.