Silvestre Revueltas

Mexican classical composer

• Born: December 31, 1899
• Birthplace: Santiago Papasquiaro, Durango, Mexico
• Died: October 5, 1940
• Place of death: Mexico City, Mexico

A volatile musical force, Revueltas composed music that is polytonal, highly rhythmic, and influenced by popular music idioms as well as indigenous folkloric elements.

The Life

Silvestre Revueltas (sihl-VEHS-truh reh-VWEHL-tahs) was a Mexican composer whose writings constituted a small but significant body of music. He was born in the mountainous state of Durango, but he spent most of his years in Mexico City until his death in 1940 from pneumonia brought on by alcoholism. A child prodigy on the violin, Revueltas gave his first recital at age eleven, and at seventeen he traveled to Austin, Texas, to study at St. Edward’s College before completing his musical training at Chicago Musical College. Upon returning to Mexico City in 1929, Revueltas taught violin and composition at the conservatory, and he served as assistant conductor of Orquesta Sinfónica de México under Carlos Chavez.

The Music

The music of Revueltas reflects the influence of his culture. His music is best described as highly rhythmic, raw, and sensual, yet it is refined in a manner set apart from the European musical tradition. There is also a folkloric quality to his music, though it is rare for Revueltas to quote melodies or rhythms directly. He weaves folklike melodies into his music, and he infuses them with rhythmic ostinatos, dissonant drones, and countermelodies. During his short lifetime, Revueltas composed nearly forty works before his untimely death, including six works for full orchestra and eight works for film.

Sensemayá. Composed in 1938, Sensemayá is a musical setting of a poem of the same title by Nicolas Guillen that describes the ritual sacrifice of a snake. There are two main themes in this composition, which are set in opposition. The first is introduced by the tuba and continued by the brass section while the strings initiate the second. These themes are representative of the two elements at odds in this composition—the snake and the ceremonial leaders—and their struggle is exacerbated by a relentless ostinato of syncopated rhythms. It begins with a slow trill in the bass clarinet that gives way to a rhythmic ostinato played by a solo bassoon. This is all accompanied by the percussion section, which drives the music forward with its syncopated rhythms. The first theme is introduced by the tuba and is joined by other members of the brass section. After a series of horn calls and clarinet trills, the strings begin with the second theme, which is ultimately overtaken by the brass. Following the climax, the two themes play in opposition, pitted against each other, all while being thrown tumultuously forward by the unrelenting rhythms into a riotous state.

The Night of the Mayas. Revueltas wrote the music for the 1939 film La noche de los Mayas and it was later arranged in a four-movement suite by José Ives Limantour. It is the largest in scale of all of his works, and it is scored for orchestra with an immense percussion battery of twelve players. The opening movement shares the same title as the complete work, and it sets the mood of the piece. It is descriptive in nature, evoking an untamed and primitive locale. The second movement, titled Noche de Jaranas (Night of Revelry), is a play on words. Jaranas can mean revelry, but it also refers to a folkloric dance form. The movement is noted for its polymetric composition and unique timbral colors. The third movement, Noche de Yucatán (Night of the Yucatan) serves as the slow movement of the composition, and it is written in the form of a nocturne. Here he quotes a Mayan folk song, which for Revueltas is rare. The suite comes to an end with the finale, titled Noche de Encantamiento (Night of Enchantment). Composed as a theme and variations, it takes on a frenzied pace as the percussion section drives persistently forward, repeating melodic material from earlier movements before bringing itself to a vociferous end.

Homenaje a Federico García Lorca. Paying homage to the late Andalusian poet, this work is a three-movement composition scored for a small chamber orchestra, and it is considered by many critics to be the most advanced composition of Revueltas. The lively disposition of the two outer movements seems to contradict idea of a lament, but in Mexican and Spanish cultures it is customary to regard death as a celebration of life. The first movement, Baile (dance), is a fast, energetic movement that begins with a quasi-recitative trumpet solo accompanied by a dissonant chord in the piano. Following the poignant character of the solo, the movement proceeds with an energetic dance section in 4/16 time. The lamentlike second movement, Duelo (sorrow), is best described as a trumpet solo with orchestral ostinato-like accompaniment. The work concludes with a movement titled Son, incorrectly translated as Sound in published scores. Son has no English equivalent, but it can be best described as a traditional musical form of Mexico, and here it serves as the loudest, most complex movement of the work. Beginning with fortissimo septuplets in the piano and strings and following with multiple glissandi and driving staccato sections, the movement advances through multiple metric changes and variations in timbre and sonority.

This work illustrates the unique timbral elements of Revueltas’s compositional style; he gives the tuba prominence as a solo instrument with high and fast melodies, often doubling the piccolo line. Interesting instrumental treatment is also exhibited in the doubling of the clarinet and piccolo and the use of extended parallel thirds. The latter is analogous to mariachi music popular in Mexican culture. Revueltas also writes many of his melodic lines a half-step apart, favoring piercing, dissonant sonorities.

Musical Legacy

Revueltas’s music is known for its complex rhythmic organization, a unique harmonic language of melodic and harmonic dissonance, and experimentation with polytonal composition. He is also noted for his ability to absorb the contemporary Mexican folk and popular sources around him and mold them into a unique mixture of highly chromatic and occasionally abrasive-sounding material infused with his signature driving, ostinatolike rhythms. Though he prefers not to be called a nationalist composer, his work is most often described as Mestizo realism. Through his synthesis of folkloric elements with his own unique style, Revueltas captured the essence and rawness of his culture, exposing the soul of his people.

Principal Works

ballet:El renacuajo paseador, 1940.

chamber works: String Quartet No. 1, 1930; String Quartet No. 2, 1931; String Quartet No. 3, 1931; String Quartet No. 4, 1932 (Música de feria); Planos, 1934; Homenaje a Federico García Lorca, 1936.

film scores:El indio, 1936 (The Indian); Redes, 1936 (The Fishermen’s Nets); Vámonos con Pancho Villa, 1936 (Let’s Go with Pancho Villa); El signo de la muerte, 1939 (The Sign of Death); La noche de los Mayas, 1939 (The Night of the Mayas); Mala yerba, 1940; ­Que viene mi marido!, 1940.

orchestral works:Cuanáhuac, 1930 (revised 1932); Colorines, 1932; Ranas, 1932 (Frogs); Janitzio, 1933 (revised 1936); Itinerarios, 1938; Sensemayá, 1938.

Bibliography

Béhague, Gerard. Music in Latin America: An Introduction. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall 1979. This is an excellent survey of Latin American music and composers, including Revueltas.

Garland, Peter. In Search of Silvestre Revueltas: Essays, 1978-1990. Santa Fe, N.Mex.: Soundings Press, 1991. One of the few resources in English about Revueltas, this covers the significant details of the composer’s life and works.

Hess, Carol A. “Silvestre Revueltas in Republican Spain: Music as Political Utterance.” Latin American Music Review 18, no. 2 (Fall/Winter, 1997): 278-296. This article chronicles Revueltas’ time spent in Spain during the civil war as a member of the group League of Revolutionary Artists and Writers (LEAR).

Malmström, Dan. Introduction to Twentieth Century Mexican Music. Uppsala, Sweden: Institute of Musicology, Uppsala University, 1974. The first two chapters of this book discuss Revueltas and other contemporary Mexican composers.

Mayer-Serra, Otto. “Silvestre Revueltas and Musical Nationalism in Mexico.” The Musical Quarterly 27, no. 2 (April, 1941): 123-45. Written within a year of Revueltas’s death, this article examines the effect of nationalism on the composer’s unique compositional style.