Another good recording. Monica, in addition to your performance, your mike work is good - the fadeout at the end of #16 was 'there' - and I listen to it through the speakers (not headphones).
I'll be sure to listen to the 'new' #14 before leaving the audition room.

Ha! The new #14 is better. Maybe I just have the volume turned up higher today, but I can hear the resonance of the strings this time, which adds the eerie quality. I'll let chris and rainer decide if the other matters were settled.

Thank you, Stu! There's no mic work involved really. I just always hang on to chords/notes at the end for a long time. And these pieces in particular call for a nice long ending...


Both links play the same file, my newer no. 14.

Or even dotted 8ths followed by a 16th
I know there are no triplets in the actual score, I was referring to the way you played the dotted patterns in your previous version, i.e. 6/8-style.

If you add the durations of the dotted 8th and the 16th together, and call the sum 100%, then strictly speaking the 16ths should last 25%. Right?
In your version 1 they lasted way more than that: about 33% or "triplets".
In version 2 you can't deny that most of them last significantly less than 25%, that's what I meant by over-correcting.

But since the man himself plays them that way, you are forgiven.

Ugh....I thought something didn't look right when I was typing that....

I'm really enjoying the Mompou. Such creative and moody music. Expertly played too. Thanks for sharing him with us.

These are very good. The music's not particularly my cup of tea, but I listened to the full set and you have such a lovely sound that I really rather enjoyed it. It IS a Yamaha, isn't it? I've never heard one sound as good as that.

Thank you, Heather. I sort of wish I wasn't introducing Mompou to you with this set. Although this music is well-crafted, it's his Cancions y Danzas and also his preludes, plus a couple other miscellaneous pieces that are more appealing to the general public. It takes a special ear I think to enjoy this set.



Thanks. I know....when I first started listening to this music, it wasn't my cup of tea either. It's growing on me now. And yes, it's my same Yamaha piano....haha. But you know what? Something amazing happened....I turned my piano around and the change in sound is incredible! To me, at least. I guess to you too, since you heard the difference. When I first sat down and started playing it after I had turned it around, I couldn't believe my ears. It sounded like a different piano! The basses were fuller and richer and I just loved it and couldn't stop playing for hours.

Just listened to this set. Very interesting, reflective and indeed haunting, even bleaker-sounding than the first book, somehow (maybe it is the reduction in the number of popular-melody songs). I liked the continuation from the first book the best (no. 10). Also the sound is really marvellous, as is your playing. My only qualms are that I expected the middle section of piece that gave you the creeps to be more violent, but that could be the album booklet's words (Bartokian) playing tricks on me.

Again great job. I'll be sure to explore more Mompou in the near future as well.

Wow Monica, this is amazingly good! Your control of the sound and keeping a sense of very long phrases is perfect and shows a great concentration and dedication - I can almost feel you living the music and not only playing it. Which gives a very gloomy impression, especially when listening to all in one go. It must be quite taxing emotionally to play through this with the intensity you project. In a way the tonalities remind me of late Scriabin, but without his off-putting fireworks. Congratulations!

Thank you Jonathan and Joachim.

I recently added some information to the Musica Callada page and most of it is Mompou's own words describing the set. I think everyone should read it, as it certainly helps one to understand the music more and also explains why it is not 'violent' music.

"this music has no air or light. It is a weak heart beat, you cannot ask it to reach more than a few inches into space, but it's mission is to reach the profound depths of our soul and the secret regions of our spirit's spirit. This music is quiet (callada) because one listens to it within. Contained and reserved. It's emotion is secret and only becomes sound from resonance under the cold cape of our society. It is my desire that this music, should bring us closer to the warmth of life, and the expression of the human heart, that is always the same and constantly changing."

(is that better, Chris? )

Not really, I think it's a load of drivel. Weak heartbeat, spirit's spirit, secret emotion, oh dear.... But if these are Mompou's own words I suppose one cannot object to them.

"Everyone hears only what he understands." ~Goethe

I hear you not

I believe you!