Antonio Soler and the unanswered question

It is no exaggeration to claim that Antonio Francisco Javier José Soler (1729-1783) was the most original Spanish composer of the Eighteenth Century, an author active in all musical genres and forms current at the time – with the sole exception of opera (just like Johann Sebastian Bach – who never wrote one). To recognize that he was remarkably original does not necessarily mean he did not have models. He certainly did, and the most phenomenal one Soler had was no less than Domenico Scarlatti. Whether he had been a pupil of the great Spanish composer (of Italian-Neapolitan origin) is uncertain. American musicologist, and specialist in Spanish music, Gilbert Chase believed so (The Music of Spain, 2nd ed., New York, Dover, 1959, p. 115). Whether that happens to be true or not is quite immaterial because, even if Soler did not literally “study with Scarlatti”, he certainly was his pupil in the ideal sense of the term. No one who plays his keyboard sonatas or carefully listens to them can doubt they follow the form as well as the spirit of Scarlatti. There is, however, a fundamental difference between the two: while Scarlatti seems at times to be there trying to make you laugh Soler, on the contrary, just seems to wish to surprise you and be gently entertaining.

As far as musical form is concerned, Soler did not improve upon, or alter in any fundamental way, the one-movement sonata as practiced by his “maestro”. As far as the “spirit” he also followed Scarlatti in producing one-movement sonatas that are as diverse from one another as they possibly can. Musical ideas, in each one of them, just like in Scarlatti, simply flow out of one another according to the eternal principle of similarity and contrast – a principle easy enough to state and which, however, to be put into practice, requires a constant supply of imagination. Italian composer and musicologist Gianfrancesco Malipiero, a staunch herald of Italian music, once observed that artists like Scarlatti are so prolific in good melodious ideas that they need not dwell upon them for very long, because others are urging to come out; German composers, on the contrary, only take a “theme” and then torture it to death in all sorts of ways for minutes on end! Soler, in this respect, surely deserves to be considered an honorary Italian.

What especially strikes the listener in the music by Antonio Soler is the original, sometimes even bizarre, and unpredictable modulations he can produce, as it were, at the drop of a hat. Indeed, he was recognized and, at the same time, the controversial master of the unexpected modulation. He was not just a composer and organist but, also, a theorist and a pedagogue. As such he published a treatise on modulation, which remained controversial for quite some time (Llave de la Modulación y antigüedades de la música, Madrid, 1762). It is a work which is, in a way, the equivalent in the domain of harmony of another one dealing with counterpoint, written by an equally imaginative and bizarre composer some forty years later: Antonin Reicha’s Über das neue Fugensystem, of 1805. That only goes to show how, although we think we appreciate “original” composers, some of the most original and innovative great masters of the past remain to be noticed and appreciated.

I think I should now add a few details, and explain that Antonio Soler was not exactly Spanish, but rather Catalan. The very special culture of Cataluña has produced over time scores of very original artists. Among them: Isaac Albeniz, Salvador Dalí, Antonio Gaudí, Joan Miró. Antonio Soler fits therefore very well into this cultural landscape. Soler, incidentally, was a priest (and spent most of his life at El Escorial, the magnificent royal palace, chapel, and monastery built by King Philip II outside of Madrid two centuries earlier), and also devoted much of his energy to mathematics, and inventions of various kinds (he invented a tuning box that was used to demonstrate differences between tones and semitones); and as if that were not enough to keep him busy, he was also an expert in organ design and construction. It is therefore quite astonishing that he could be the prolific author of over 400 compositions; among them over 120 sonatas for harpsichord, six quintets for organ and strings, six double organ concertos, 10 masses, five requiems, 132 Villancicos (the principal genre of secular polyphony in Spain, may be regarded as the equivalent of the Italian Frottola), and several other works, including a sonata for harpsichord entitled Fandango which is possibly the only one of his works we occasionally get to hear performed.

So, why his large catalogue of compositions hardly ever heard? It is a question pointing to the fact that most of what is classified as classical music very seldom, if at all, ever enters the canon of works presented in a concert format. It is a paradox that, to the best of my knowledge, receives very little attention: music can be classified as “classical” (in other words, highbrow) and, at the same time, be simply “ignored” by lovers of classical music – like it happens to the compositions by Antonio Soler.