Music archive entry

This piece draws on some of the techniques of medieval music - use of an existing melody to give a structure to the piece, a bass line which accelerates as the piece progresses, exact mathematical calculation of when events should occur - to construct a work which refers to two other works of art.

One is the poem by Antonio Machado which begins "El crimen fue en Granada" - The crime took place in Granada. The poem is an account of the execution by firing squad of the poet and playwright, Federico Garcia Lorca by the invading Fascist rebels near the start of the Spanish Civil War.

Machado was the best known poet of the generation before Lorca's. The jagged phrases which interrupt the flow of the bass line are derived from the vocal rhythms of Machado's poem.

The other source is Bach's aria for Alto from St John's Passion, "Es ist vollbracht!" - It is finished - sung at the end of the section on the death of Jesus. The opening section of the melody provides the bass line of the piece, and the short figures on upper strings, piano, and percussion.