Casals Premi

When Pablo Casals set to work on an oratorio titled El Presebre (The Manger) in 1943, he intended it to be performed on the occasion of Franco's downfall. In the 17 years since then, El Caudillo has looked as healthy as ever, while age has begun to slow up even the indefatigable Casals, who just turned 84. In the course of his birthday celebrations, the composer bowed to the inevitable: in Acapulco, at the climax of a two-week Mexican Casals festival that ended last week, he mounted the podium to give El Presebre its world premiere.

The oratorio is based on a poem by an old comrade of Casals--Spain's Juan Alavedra, who, like Casals, went into exile in Prades after the Civil War. In three emotion-packed hours the work unfolded the entire Nativity story, starting with the journey to Bethlehem and ending with the arrival of the kings and a final hosanna of thanksgiving. More operatic than oratorio-like in style, the work opened with a skirl of oboes and the beating of a high-pitched hand drum, developed its theme in a flow of Catalan folk-flavored melody, interspersed with grandiose choral effects and rich orchestral passages that sounded like amplifications of Casals' own famed cello tone. High points were an impressionistic dialogue between oboes and clarinets, which suggested the mystery of the birth, and the bright, triumphant closing canticle, which employed the full 150-member chorus (among the singers: Casals' 23-year-old wife).

The 2,800 spectators gave Composer-Conductor Casals a ten-minute standing ovation, all the more enthusiastic because he had almost failed to make it to the premiere. A few hours before the performance he felt ill, was told that he had a slight pulmonary congestion. To his doctor he announced: "Tonight I am going to conduct even if they have to take me out of there dead!''

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