{"id":19034,"date":"2022-08-30T15:30:09","date_gmt":"2022-08-30T13:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/?p=170979"},"modified":"2022-08-30T17:13:27","modified_gmt":"2022-08-30T15:13:27","slug":"gabriela-lena-frank-an-exclusive-interview-with-the-american-composer","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/rss_feed\/gabriela-lena-frank-an-exclusive-interview-with-the-american-composer\/","title":{"rendered":"Gabriela Lena Frank: an exclusive interview with the American composer"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Charlotte Smith\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Tuesday, 30 August 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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I was 16 when I took my first formal music composition programme.<\/b> I was fortunate that my first teacher at the San Francisco Conservatory, Dan Becker, had a deep love both of classical music and of music from non-western cultures and popular idioms. This, combined with my lifelong enjoyment of music as a young piano student and improviser plus my exposure to South American folkloric styles, paved the way for me to choose composition the following year when I enrolled as a freshman at Rice University.<\/p>\n

Imposter syndrome is real!<\/b> It persisted until the last years of my doctoral studies when I began to travel in Peru, meeting my maternal family and internalising these travel\/musical experiences. My music transformed and I found the start of a real \u2018voice\u2019.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I needed to write Leyendas: An Andean Walkabout<\/i><\/b>. It\u2019s an early work, the last of my student days, and such an honest piece, reflecting and refracting what I was hearing and seeing in Peru. Looking back, I see it as a kind of reconciliation of my exterior world with my interior questions about my identity and heritage. It\u2019s been remarkable for me to see how often it is performed and in so many countries. I think it touched a nerve.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I no longer start with a blank page.<\/b> After all these years, there is so much material on the cutting room floor from other pieces, often because I haven\u2019t got the time to maximise an idea\u2019s potential. So, I just save the good ideas for later. Often, the ideas are transformed beyond recognition in their new guises, but they have long roots in previous work.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve just received the new scores to my first opera<\/b> \u2013 El \u00faltimo sue\u00f1o de Frida y Diego<\/i> was co-commissioned by San Diego Opera and San Francisco Opera. I\u2019m taking a break after this massive project, and will then turn my attention to a 45-minute symphony for the Philadelphia Orchestra called Picaflor <\/i>(Hummingbird), to be based on creation myths of Latin America.<\/p>\n

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