Isaac Manuel Francisco Albйniz

Isaac Manuel Francisco Albйniz was born on May 29, 1860 in Camprodуn, the Catalan province of Gerona in northeastern Spain. As a child he was exceptionally gifted at the piano and gave his first public performance in Barcelona at the age of four. Two years later his mother took him to Paris where, for nine months, he studied privately with a renowned professor of piano at the Paris Conservatory. An attempt was made to enroll Albйniz at the Conservatory, but the boy was denied admission because he was too young. Upon returning to Spain he gave several concerts and published his first composition, Marcha Militar.

In 1868 the Albйniz family moved to Madrid where Isaac began studying at the Royal Conservatory of Music. The boy’s astonishing pianistic ability inspired great praise and he was acclaimed as Spain’s greatest prodigy, often being compared to Mozart. Soon, however, Albйniz became restless and impatient with his studies and attempted many times to run away from home. Twice he ran away from home and supported his living by playing piano for the public and, sometimes, a job as a potter at the deck. After returning home and with the companion of his father, Albйniz first performed in the New World in the spring of 1875 when he gave a series of concerts in Puerto Rico. From there he traveled to Cuba where, in the fall of 1875, he gave several more concerts before returning to Spain.

Upon returning to Spain, the 15 year old Albйniz gave concerts in several Spanish cities, including Barcelona, Valencia, and Salamanca. Realizing that his child prodigy days were nearing an end, and that the transition from child prodigy to mature artist is never a simple one, Albйniz enrolled at the Leipzig Conservatory where he hoped to gain the measure of credibility that one gets from studying at a world famous institution. While there he studied piano with students of Liszt. Short of money, ill at ease with the German language, and unhappy with the rigorous discipline imposed on him by his teachers, Albйniz returned to Spain after spending less than two months in the Saxon city where Bach, Schumann, and Mendelssohn once lived.

Later that same year, Albйniz obtained a royal stipend to study at the Brussels Conservatory where, in 1879, he won first prize in piano performance. Following this he made a well-publicized tour of Europe. His greatest ambition at the time, however, was to study with Franz Liszt. Therefore, at age twenty, he left Brussels for Budapest in order to fulfill his dream. Although many scholars debate on the topic, Albйniz, it seems, traveled all the way to the Hungarian capital only to find that Liszt was not in residence there at that time. Upon discovering that Liszt was unavailable, Albйniz returned to Madrid where he spent the next couple of years giving concerts and touring the principal towns and cities of Spain. It was around this time that he composed his first works for the musical theater, three zarzuelas, one of which, Cantalones de Gracia, was well received by the Madrid press.

The year 1883 was a major turning point in Albйniz's life. After a South American tour, he settled in Barcelona where he made the acquaintance of Felipe Pedrell, who is sometimes described as the father of Spanish music. Pedrell made a deep impression for Albйniz that Spanish composers should compose Spanish music, who up to this point, composed almost exclusively in the European