Content area
Full text
Lawrence Schenbeck(EDITOR)
Editor's Note: The choral and church music of pre-twentieth-century Mexico has become increasingly popular in recent years, thanks to the research of such pioneers as Robert Stevenson and, more recently, recordings of this repertoire. Two guest columnists this month relate their adventurous attempts to add to our knowledge of Mexico's music and music education.
Teresa BowerSUCCESSFUL ARCHIVAL research often involves a scavenger hunt demanding patience and tenacity on the part of the researcher. In many ways, my search was just as rewarding as the documents and information I obtained. Along the way, I met many wonderful people whose help was invaluable and who became good friends by the end of the process.
My own journey began when I heard the Chanticleer recording Mexican Baroque . Though I had never heard music composed in Colonial Mexico before, my instincts told me this music had not been composed in a vacuum; there must be much more where this came from. I read some articles written by musicologist Robert Stevenson; one of these contained a bibliography of music manuscripts written for the Puebla Cathedral. According to Stevenson, the manuscripts had been microfilmed by Thomas Stanford, an American musicologist living and working in Mexico, and several sets had been deposited in libraries in the United States. A letter from Dr. Stevenson confirmed this and suggested that films were held in the Library of Congress. However, a search there and at several other American libraries suggested by Stevenson failed to turn up any microfilms. My goal was to find these microfilms and the original manuscripts, and from them create modern performing editions of some of this wonderful music.
What followed was a search that lasted almost a year. In that time, I was helped by Susana Salgado, musicologist at the Library of Congress; Manual Saldivar, chief attaché for music at the Cultural Institute, Mexican Embassy, Washington, D.C.; and Delores Brugh, professor of organ at the University of Iowa. Each of these persons was able to put me in touch with someone in Mexico who might be helpful. An internet search yielded the address of Dr. Craig Russell, editor of the music sung on the Chanticleer disc and author of several articles on music of the Mexican...