{"id":12389,"date":"2019-02-26T15:31:33","date_gmt":"2019-02-26T23:31:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/?p=12389"},"modified":"2019-03-05T15:50:06","modified_gmt":"2019-03-05T23:50:06","slug":"the-barrios-renaissance-the-great-paraguayan-composer-guitarist-has-never-been-more-popular","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/the-barrios-renaissance-the-great-paraguayan-composer-guitarist-has-never-been-more-popular\/","title":{"rendered":"The Barrios Renaissance: The Great Paraguayan Composer\/Guitarist has Never Been More Popular"},"content":{"rendered":"
BY MARK SMALL | FROM THE SPRING 2019 ISSUE OF CLASSICAL GUITAR<\/a><\/h6>\n

The recent wave of interest in the music of Agust\u00edn Barrios Mangor\u00e9, as powerful as it is surprising, continues to surge across the guitar world. It\u2019s been more than three decades since editions of Barrios\u2019 compositions became widely available, and today, an ever-growing number of guitarists are mining the Barrios catalog. This point of arrival, however, took about a century to reach.<\/p>\n

Born in 1885 in San Juan Bautista de las Misiones in southern Paraguay, Barrios undertook formal studies with Gustavo Sosa Escalada, who schooled him in the Sor and Aguado guitar methods. At 25, Barrios left Paraguay, and as a concert guitarist he visited and\/or lived in 20 Latin American countries and in Europe. He spent his final years in El Salvador, where he died in 1944 at 59. After his passing, his reputation was kept alive by a coterie of friends, former students, and performers.
\n\"\"
\nToday, acclaimed Paraguayan guitarist Berta Rojas proclaims Barrios a \u201cnational treasure\u201d in Paraguay. During his lifetime and afterwards, Barrios was celebrated as a performer and composer in Latin America, but it took time for the rest of the world to catch up. Although many tireless devotees helped preserve Barrios\u2019 music and bring it to the worldwide guitar community, three figures\u2014Rojas, Barrios scholar Richard \u201cRico\u201d Stover, and guitarist John Williams\u2014have done much to stoke the renewed interest in Barrios.<\/p>\n

SEEKING A CHAMPION<\/span><\/h4>\n

There are varying opinions about the 1921 meeting between Andr\u00e9s Segovia and Barrios in Buenos Aires, Argentina. At the time, Barrios was famous throughout Latin America, while Segovia was known internationally. In a recent phone interview, Stover related that Barrios played many of his compositions for Segovia on the Maestro\u2019s guitar during a two-hour meeting at Segovia\u2019s hotel room. In the Segovia biography Don Andr\u00e9s and Paquita<\/i>, author Alfredo Escande reproduces an upbeat letter dated October 15, 1921, from Barrios to his Uruguayan friend Mart\u00edn Borda y Pagola, in which Barrios reports that he had \u201cwon Segovia over,\u201d and that Segovia wanted to play his piece La Catedral <\/i>in concerts. Barrios didn\u2019t have the music with him and urged Pagola to send it to him so Segovia could have it before sailing for Europe on November 2.<\/span><\/p>\n

Escande also quotes Paraguayan guitarist Sila Godoy, who claims he was present years later when Segovia spoke of the fabled meeting to members of his 1959 summer classes in Siena, Italy. According to Godoy, Segovia said he felt Barrios had \u201ca magnificent concert piece\u201d in La Catedral, <\/i>and that he had asked for the music, but it never arrived. Barrios was hopeful that Segovia playing his music would bring him the widespread attention he felt his music deserved. Many view the failed connection as a severe setback for Barrios.<\/p>\n

Stover, however, is skeptical that Segovia ever would have become a champion for Barrios. \u201cSegovia played Norte<\/i>\u00f1a<\/i> by [Argentinian] Gomez Crespo, Natalia<\/i>, a waltz by [Venezuelan] Antonio Lauro, and some preludes and etudes by [Brazilian] Heitor Villa-Lobos,\u201d Stover says. \u201cThat\u2019s about it. He was not too interested in Latin American music.\u201d In the 2010 BBC Radio 4 program Great Lives<\/i>, John Williams went further: \u201c[Segovia] used to forbid people in his classes in the 1960s and \u201970s from playing Barrios\u2019 music. The Spanish culture looked down on Latin American culture\u2014not so much today, but in [1921], when Segovia met Barrios, it was quite strong.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if Segovia had liked La Catedral<\/i>, other things about Barrios clashed with Segovia\u2019s artistic sensibilities. Among them were Barrios\u2019 performances in traditional Paraguayan Guaran\u00ed garb and his unique blending of elements from popular music, South American rhythms, and European classical influences in his compositions. Williams characterizes Barrios\u2019 style of playing as \u201cstraight from the heart.\u201d \u201cBeing so open\u2014heart on sleeve\u2014had been frowned on,\u201d Williams told the BBC. \u201cI don\u2019t think that would have gone down well with Segovia.\u201d None of these things, however, troubled Williams.<\/p>\n

ADVOCATES AT LAST<\/span><\/h4>\n

The album John Williams\u2014Barrios<\/i>, released in 1977, was the first full-length album of Barrios\u2019 music. As a teenager, Williams had been introduced to a few Barrios works by the late, great Venezuelan guitarist Alirio D\u00edaz. \u201cWhen I was a student at summer classes in Italy, Alirio gave me two pieces by Barrios, which I always played,\u201d Williams said. \u201cIn 1969, Carlos Pay\u00e9s, a medical student from El Salvador, came through London with copies of 50 or 60 manuscripts and early publications of Barrios\u2019 music. I went through them very thoroughly and was knocked out by the range and quality of the music. It was an absolute revelation to me. [Those pieces were] what my recording in the 1970s was based on.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Williams began performing Barrios\u2019 music around the world, and in 1995, he released From the Jungles of Paraguay: John Williams Plays Barrios<\/i>, which offered updated renditions of many pieces from the first disc and introduced five additional titles\u2014including Julia Florida<\/i>, Las Abejas<\/i>, and Vals No. 4<\/i>, which are now staples of the repertoires of countless performers. \u201cThe contribution of John Williams is invaluable,\u201d says Stover. \u201cHe put the music at the level it needed to be on, right away.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n