Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga

Juan Crisóstomo Jacobo Antonio de Arriaga y Balzola (January 27, 1806 – January 17, 1826) was a Spanish Basque composer. He was nicknamed "the Spanish Mozart" after he died, because, like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, he was both a child prodigy and an accomplished composer who died young. They also shared the same first and second baptismal names; and they shared the same birthday, January 27 (fifty years apart).

Music

Main article: List of compositions by Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga

The amount of Arriaga's music that has survived to the present day is quite small, reflecting his early death. It includes:

• Opera: Arriaga wrote an opera, Los esclavos felices ("The Happy Slaves"), in 1820 when he was 13. It was produced in Bilbao. Only the overture and some fragments have survived.
• Symphony: Arriaga composed a Symphony in D (Sinfonía a gran orquesta), which uses D major and D minor so equally that it is not in either key.
• String quartets: At the age of 16, Arriaga wrote three sparkling and idiomatic string quartets that were published in 1824, and were the only works of his published during his lifetime.
• Other works: Arriaga also wrote the following:
  • An octet, Nada y Mucho scored for String Quartet, Bass, Trumpet, Guitar and Piano.
  • Pieces of church music: a Mass (lost), Stabat Mater, Salve Regina, Et vitam venturi saeculi (lost), cantatas (Agar, Erminia, All' Aurora, Patria)
  • Instrumental compositions: a nonet, Tres Estudios de Caracter for piano, La Hungara for violin and piano, Variations for String Quartet and numerous Romances

Arriaga's music was used to create an opera pasticcio, Die arabische Prinzessin. The work was commissioned by the Barenboim-Said Foundation from the composer Anna-Sophie Brüning and the author Paula Fünfeck, and is based on a traditional Arabic tale. The piece was premiered under the title Die Sultana von Cadiz by the Youth Orchestra of the Barenboim-Said Foundation and local children's choirs at the Cultural Palace, Ramallah on 14 July 2009. The music publisher Boosey & Hawkes lists further performance runs in Leipzig (in 2011); in Bonn, Bilbao, and Barañáin (in 2013); and in Madrid, Coburg, and Linz (in 2014).