Torroba: La voz de la guitarra (SACD)

After his recent recording dedicated to Bach's sonatas and partitas in his own arrangements, Franz Halász returns to Spanish music with this concerto dedicated to Federico Moreno Torroba. Moreno Torroba, the composer of many of the best-known zarzuelas, did not initially seem destined to specialize in guitar music. It was his symphonic poems that caught the attention of the legendary guitarist Andrés Segovia. He commissioned Moreno Torroba's first compositions for guitar, although the composer was not familiar with the instrument. The compositions collected here show a composer who, although deeply rooted in the Spanish musical tradition, had a flair for new developments, including the music of Claude Debussy and Igor Stravinsky. And he created a personal, impressionist-influenced language that would later influence guitar music throughout the 20th century, from Heitor Villa-Lobos to Leo Brouwer. Franz Halász, winner of a Latin Grammy, is a highly acclaimed guitarist who has himself expanded the repertoire of his instrument to include arrangements by Manuel de Falla and Isaac Albéniz. On a guitar built in 1936 by the legendary guitar maker Hermann Hauser, Halász transforms the instrument into a multi-faceted prism through which the musician can, in the words of Segovia, "refract the light of music into orchestral sound".