I. Seville (1882-1902)

        Joaquín Turina Pérez was born in Seville on the 9th of December 1882 in a very united, happy, middle-class well-to-do family, and surrounded by an artistic atmosphere that would positively influence on the spirit of the future musician.

        Joaquín and Concepción are his parents. The father, of Italian descent, was also born in Seville in 1847. He was a painter who attended the Escuela Provincial de Bellas Artes in Seville, and is considered a remarkable painter of the Sevillian School.

        His mother was born in a small village in the province of Seville. He was a hit older than her husband and was always devoted to her home and family.

        As a very young child, when he was just four, one of the servants gave him an accordion with which he used to do all sort of improvisations, and, as a result, acquired a reputation of child prodigy, as he would accompany the girl’s choir of the Santo Ángel school, where he was taught his first solfeggio lessons.

        Later on he attended classes at San Ramón School, where, apart from the regular studies (bachillerato), he started regular piano studies with Mr. Enrique Rodríguez.

        In 1894 he started harmony and counterpoint studies with Mr Evaristo García Torres, who, as Turina stated: “was an old man as good as wise”, and “although he was educated in the Slavonic School, he had a great knowledge, and his works, extremely beautiful, have an ingenuous inspiration, like Bellini."

        Somewhere else, Turina added: "Let me make a tribute to, to me, the most beloved memory of Mr Evaristo García Torres, my first teacher, whose works, somehow Italian, but with admirable ingenuity and purity, I keep recorded in my own handwriting, as the most precious treasure of the most venerable of the priests and musicians". "I owe him the good orientation that his lessons gave. me. He taught me things I have not had to rectify later on."

        With some mastery of the piano, and together with some friends, Turina created an instrumental band called La Orquestina, which was in fact a quintet with piano. Their performances in parties and meetings were very frequent and successful Turina wrote his first rehearsals as a composer for this band.

        He also often performed, playing together with his maestros, the immense collection of overtures, fantasías and variations, doing wonders in the Raymond and in the Summaries.

        The official debut of the young Turina was on a Sunday, I4th March 1897, in the Piazza of Seville, where he took pan in a concert organised by the Sociedad de Cuartetos (The Quartets Society), interpreting on the piano a Fantasía sobre el Moisés de Rossini (Fantasía about the Rossini Moses), composed by the German Sigismond [Fortuné François] Thalberg (1812-1871). In performing this piece, which becomes even more difficult to be interpreted by such small hands that could not reach an octave, Turina had a great success, a success that is not reached by many accomplished artists in this kind of compositions. It is in these or similar terms that the reviews on the local papers talked of Turina.

        This success, logically, was an enormous stimulus for him, who from then on, and without giving up his piano studies, started, timidly in the beginning and with great decision later, his first steps in composition.

        It was then when he started the serious creation of several works for piano for chamber ensembles, and several others, of religious style, for voices and keyboard. Among these last ones, there appeared the Coplas al Señor de Pasión that he composed based on the text by Mr Francisco Rodríguez Marín for the Hermandad de Pasión. This was his first orchestral piece. “I myself conducted it”, Turina stated. “In the Salvador Church's choir, the little orchestra was settled, composed by twenty musicians. The tenor, Pardo, and the baritone, Astillero, sang the solos, accompanied by a small men choir. My maestro, Mr Evaristo García Torres, carne to the debut."

        His enthusiasm to create a major work made him write, at the age of fifteen approximately, an opera, La sulamita, of which Pedro Balgañón was in charge of the book. "I wrote the music with all the fervour of my young age, I orchestrated [190l-1902?] its three acts, and, full of hope, thought it was easy to perform it in the Real. "Some years later he was relieved that that performance had never been carried out.

        Not a year had passed by from his official debut when Turina performed again for the audience in Seville, from whom he kept a good memory of. This event took place on the 9th of January 1898, in the same theatre where some months before he had obtained his first applause by his fellow countrymen and women. On this occasion, he interpreted the Konzerstük, by Weber, and out of the programme, the Rapsodia húngara n. 11 (The Hungarian Rapsody n. 11), by Franz Liszt. Again it was a great success and the local reviews were again excellent, so it can be said that the young musician must have won the Sevillian public to his side.

        The few last year the musician stayed in the town where he was born were spent on improving his accomplishment of the piano for which, as usual, he had the paternal help of his maestro, Mr Enrique Rodríguez.

        Nevertheless, it was during this period when he discovered that his true vocation was the difficult path of composition; he worked on this with eagerness and enthusiasm, but he soon discovered that he could not learn anything else from his dear teacher, Mr Evaristo. Mr Evaristo himself honestly made him see that the only possibility of widening his knowledge on the complicated art of creation was outside Seville, pointing at Madrid as the first, though not definite, step. Despite this, he continued composing, but as time went by, he realised of the truth in his maestro’s words, as he had to face many difficulties that did not let him develop his ideas, in spite of being at the beginning of his career and very far away throw the way that, almost ten years later, Isaac Albéniz would teach him.

        Life in Seville in musical terms was, in the young years of Turina, naturally poor. In this sense, it has to be said that the public of that town, as of any Spanish province, and particularly of those further away from Madrid or Barcelona, would prefer to listen to a fragment from an opera, Italian, of course, than to any symphonic piece. It is beyond doubt which that Italicised atmosphere was of great influence on our musician, as all his early work, including the religious pieces, are marked with an Italian taste.

        1882 had passed by long ago, nonetheless, twenty years later, Turina still lived in the same house where he was born. “It is a small house, but kind. During my childhood, it was refurbished several times, widening the patio and ornamenting it with floor and glazed tiles of Arabic style, in the main hall, in winter, and in the patio, in summer, I spent the first twenty years of my life, always by the piano, devoting all my hopes to the music and abandoning the medicine, of which I passed the first exams."

        With Turina it does not happen the situation, so often with other artists, where the parents are reluctant or contrary to him pursuing a musical career, his true vocation! But just the opposite, as it was the father, also an artist, who encouraged and provided him with all the required economic facilities to carry it out. So much so that he decided that his son, who was willing to, had to abandon Seville to be able to develop his musical knowledge, specially that related to composition. His preoccupation for his son's future has so important that he thought of every detail, and as a result all his reasons were found in his mil of the 26th of August 1903, three months before his death.

        Everything is clear: Turina, who could have lea a comfortable and pleasant live in the town where he was born, where he enjoyed everything a conformist person could ever wish (family, well-being, friends, his house, his Seville!, his girl-friend, and, in the last times, also his admirers), rather prefered to be completely successful in music, for which he abandoned the dolce far niente without giving it a second thought. This heroic attitude, which also meant fighting and sacrifice, led lo the compensation of writing, with his name, one of the most beautiful pages of the history of Spanish music.

        II. Madrid (1902-1905)

        At last! Here it comes the moment Turina had been looking forward to: his first trip to Madrid, which was, up until then, the longest distance he had ever covered: "I travelled with my father, and with the hope that La sulamita could be performed."

        Three days after his arrival to the capital of Spain, he went to paradise, the Teatro Real (The Royal Theatre) to listen to the Orquesta de la Sociedad de Conciertos (Orchestra oft he Concerts Society), which, conducted by Wassily Sapellnikow, offered to that audience the first interpretation of the Fifth Symphonv by Tchaikowsky.

        From his arrival, on the 6th of March 1902, Turina realised that the symphonic-musical atmosphere in Madrid was concentrated on the orchestra mentioned above, whose performances were of excellent quality but very rare.

        From the musical atmosphere that Turina had just found, what called his attention most was not the opera (with its exceptional and colourful performances in the Real); nor the “zarzuela” (despite being at its height); nor the concerts of the great soloists that performed very often; nor the sessions of chamber music of the French Quartet (group that, according to Turina, “was never surpassed by any other"), or of other chamber groups. These being the most famous chamber groups in Europe, like the Bohemian quartets from St. Petersburg, Rosé, and others, whose concerts were so influential on the development of taste and musical culture of the audience. What really surprised that musician who had just come from Seville were the performances of the Sociedad de Conciertos. The sonority of a big symphonic orchestra was a revelation to him. At the same time that he was listening to it, his mind was busy imagining¡ countless new ideas that, for the moment being, could not note down on music paper, as he was not able to do so. This was precisely the reason why he had come to Madrid: he urgently needed to find a person who could definitely salve all the problems he had when composing.

        His old vocation for composition, which he never gave up, was revived by perceiving the stunning sonority of a symphonic orchestra; so much so that he decided to sacrifice everything for it, even his virtuosity with the piano it this would have required that time he considered he needed for his creativity.

        At any place or any moment, he recalled the first concert he heard in the paradise of the Real. What a pleasant discovery it was to see that the sonority of an orchestra, composed by real professionals, like that of the Sociedad de Conciertos, could be so different, so beautifully different, to the orchestra in Seville he was used to!

        Becoming part of that atmosphere, despite being very modest in comparison to the existing one in other European capitals, was the reason why Turina made up his mind to leave his dear Seville.

        Following his father's suggestions, Turina visited frequently and fomented his friendship with his father's friends in the capital. Among them, and in the first place, there was the great painter Villegas, who helped him in many ways and, very especially, gave him excellent advice: “Villegas recommended me to the critic Alejandro Saint-Aubin, who was also a painter. I played some fragments of La sulamita at his studio before the splendid French Quartet, composed by Julio Francés and Odón González (violinists), Conrado del Campo (viola), and Luis Villa (violoncello).

        Many years later, at the tribute that the Real Academia de Bellas Artes (Roval Academy of Arts) of San Fernando celebrated on the 17th of January 1949, that is, three days after Turina's death, one of the musicians, Conrado del Campo, as the spokesman of this institution, recalled, with extreme precision and despite all the years that had passed by, the beginning of his friendship with the musician from Seville: "We met when we were young, at the studio of the distinguished art critic and artist Mr Alejandro Saint-Aubin. There appeared one day, just arrived from Seville, the young Turina, happy, kind and smiling. From the very first moment he became a likeable person al those meetings where we enthusiastically paid tribute to an." After a brief stay al the Court, he came back to his home town with the disappointment of realising of the impossibility of seeing the opera in which he had worked so much and had fostered so many hopes staged. Before him, other great composers like Pedrell, Bretón or Chapí had also failed to fulfil this same desire.

        Autumn 1902. He came back to Madrid for the second time, where he stayed, almost permanently; for three years. His aim was making the most of all the possibilities he had to learn regarding composition in the big city.

        In his second trip, his father did not accompany him. “I stayed al the ‘Casa de Carmen’. The Casa de Carmen was a modest boarding-house placed in a street near the Puerta del Sol and in the same building of the Teatro Cómico (Comedian Theatre).” Turina stayed in an inside room of the boarding-house where he could hear through his window the distant sound of the zarzuela music that was interpreted at the neighbouring theatre.

        Due to his open and cheerful character, Turina was soon surrounded by a group of friends. Among them, don José Villegas must be highlighted for the sincere and great fondness he always showed to the musician, as it had been stated before, and who had been in charge of the management of the Museo del Prado since the previous year.

        Villegas was not only a colleague but also a close friend of Joaquín's father. This painter made a splendid picture of our young musician when Turina was just thirteen that nowadays his children keep with great affection and care. At one of its corners, we can read the dedication: "To the proffessore of the future, his dear friend, Villegas 1895".

         Another person who was among his close friends was a “cheerful and kind” Sevillian called Fernando Fe, who was the owner of distinguished bookshop that still has a reputation nowadays.

        He met “Mr Mario de la Mota, very rich and selfish. I taught piano lessons to his niece, and due to this, I often had dinner al his place.”

        Among other friends, there also was the composer and excellent music critic Manuel Manrique de Lara.

        Turina looked forward to the sessions of the Sociedad de Conciertos, which he attended regularly. How could he not attend them if most of the programmed pieces were to talk new to him? Then he could listen, with the full orchestra, some of the compositions that he had only known as reductions for sextet or piano until then. What a difference it made! What a pleasure enjoying, in its original version, the music of the classics: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven; the Baroque: Bach, Haëndel; the wonderful fragments of the operas by Wagner, the Romantic. A complete new world of sounds was offered to him! That was what he was looking for, and from then on, there it was for him!

        It is true that at the end of the nineteenth century Madrid had an excellent orchestra, but in the field of the symphonic production there was nothing to see the future with optimism. This was so clear that even Turina expressed his opinion regarding this in 1916: “What was there in Spain of musical twenty five years ago? Very little or nothing. Not even Arrieta, nor Gaztambide, nor those maestros of the Spanish classical zarzuela, of such an Italian taste, were the most appropriate to enhance the national artistic level.”

        Another great discovery, another great surprise, was waiting for him at the gallery of the Teatro Real: “At the paradise of the Real I met Manuel de Falla, who was currently writing a zarzuela, Los amores de Inés (Inés's loves), and he was planning La vida breve (The brief life)”. From that moment on between the two Andalusian musicians there appeared a friendship, a true friendship, which lasted for the rest of their lives. The fondness towards each other was mutual and turned up spontaneously. Both were very young and with many things in common, although a difference in character was noticeable: one was cheerful, kind and smiling (that is how Conrado del Campo described him) while the other was taciturn and reserved.

         “Falla came to my place every day”, Turina says, and this makes us think that the musician from Cádiz, despite having visited Madrid very often since 1898 due to his studies, had not made any close friend since, four years later, he met his colleague from Seville, who arrived in the capital with his luggage full of hopes. Falla found in Turina the friend and mate whom, just as him, away from his birthplace, was striving to find his place in such a difficult an as the one they had chosen to pursue.

        Turina’s debut in Madrid took place in the Ateneo on the 14th of March 1903, just six years after his debut in Seville. How much he wished to have the same results as on that occasion! The circumstances were not the same, as he had to face an exigent audience which was used to hearing the best European interpreters. It is for this reason that he prepared a programme to the taste of that period, and took care of every detail. In the programme there were pieces by Scarlatti, Beethoven, Oswald, Schumann, Wagner and three pieces by the very same interpreter: La danza de los Elfos (The Elfs dance) (inspired in an Andersen's story); Variaciones sobre cantos populares (Variations on popular songs) and Gran Polaca (Big Polish). (These three pieces have disappeared, which makes us think that the author destroyed them).

        The audience, once more, was devoted to the young pianist, who, in order to correspond to its enthusiasm, extended his performance offering the tenth sonata by Beethoven.

        Turina's presence in Madrid was due to the need of improving his knowledge of composition. Nevertheless, little by little, he realised that the capital was disappointing him in this respect. He could not find that right person, and having not found him yet, he assumed he did not exit. The only musician that perhaps could have been useful to him would have been Felipe Pedrell, but Turina did not attend his classes for two reasons: firstly, and fundamentally, because Turina considered them to be more theoretical than practical; and secondly, because of his unkind character which made Turina stay away from him.

        Despite all the difficulties Turina encountered, he continued working in the composition of new pieces. Among them, he interpreted three at the Ateneo, and there was also a one-act farce of Sevillian atmosphere titled La Copla (it was performed for the first time at the Cervantes theatre, in Seville, on the 24th of March 1904, a year after its composition). There were other pieces composed in Madrid that should he added to these ones, among them there is the Trío en fa (Trio in r), a Quintet for piano and strings, the one-act farce Fea y con gracia (Ugly but charming) on a libretto by the Alvarez Quintero brothers, the Poema de las estaciones (The Seasons Poem), and other small pieces for piano which, taking into account their titles, no one would think they are written by a person from Seville: Danza de hamadríadas (Hamadriadas Dance), Poema (Poem), Poema de Amor (Love Poem), Visión de Benhur (Benhur Vision), Danza de los elfos (Elfs' Dance), Hoja de álbum (Scrapbook sheet).

        Although as we have stated above he did not take any composition lessons, on the contrary, he did take piano lessons under the management of the great pianist José Tragó whom, together with Pilar de la Mora, was the best regarded teacher in this respect in Madrid. The young pianist was very lucky to have as a teacher such a renowned artist, who Turina would remember with great affection, respect and admiration all his life.

        Oven bad news carne to Turina in family terms, yet in less than a year, both of his parents died. First it was his father (20th November 1903), and then his mother (11th October 1904).

        Since his mother's death, the idea of Mr José Villegas of moving to the French capital started making sense. Nonetheless, he had many doubts since he had a lot of work in view for the following season, including three zarzuelas. But he had a lot of time to make up his mind and it was very convenient to think about it carefully, for which he had the whole summertime, but on the 14th of July 1905, in his journey from Madrid to Seville in the surexpresso, his future is decided: PARÍS!!

        III. Paris (1905-1913)

        How could we start in a better way this chapter dedicated to Joaquín Turina's stay in the French capital than reproducing the first paragraphs of a gloss that he dedicated to Manuel de Falla due to the death of this maestro from Cádiz, since they are so autobiographic?

         “It was in Paris where the great musician was brought up. The Parisian period represents the improvement of the technique and the starting point of his production. Such an intense musical life in the big city, the clash of the diverse tendencies and ideals, such great figures of different fields, Fauré and d'Indy, Debussy and Ravel, and the Spanish campaign of Albéniz, all these made up a musical atmosphere of an enormous attraction, of great power. To all these, we should add the symphonic concerts, the opera performances, the impressionistic essays by the innovators. Perhaps he would not moved out of Paris if the Great War of 1914 would not have thrown us all out.”

         “On an October sunset [16th October 1905] I make my entrance in the French capital.” He stayed at the Family-Hotel, from which he had bad memories of, for two months. There he met Guillermo Blanch, a young Cuban with whom he later developed a long and sincere friendship.

        Neither of them was happy with the hotel services and both decided to move soon afterwards [on 19th December], and on a permanent basis, to the Kléber hotel, the same one where Falla would go two years later under Turina’s instructions.

        His loneliness (we cannot forget his parent’s death some months before) and his moving away from everything he ever loved produced on him a sensation of emptiness that he tried to compensate with a fast way of living, completely different from his usual lifestyle. His friend Blanck, seeing the musician in such a melancholic state despite his cheerful character, took care of him and introduced him to his friends and accompanied him in all the steps he had to take for his future classes, which was extremely useful to him. Those days were of great intensity, which, in some way, confused but not convinced him of their value, so he decided to “rallentizar” that frenzy to resume his life in a rhythm which he himself conducted.

        Soon after arriving in the city of lights, Turina devoted himself to a new composition: “Yesterday night [12th November 1905] I started a romanza andaluza (Andalusian Romance) for piano. How much I recalled Andalucía! As all my life and hopes are there.” From the reading of this paragraph, taken from a postcard that he sent to his girlfriend, living in Seville, we can deduce that: First; the Andalucianism was always present in the art of Turina, on this occasion with the Romanza andaluza and before with his one-act farces; secondly, the creation was continuous and spontaneous; thirdly, the nostalgia of his mother country was already present in his soul, nostalgia and love which would grow with the time passing by: Some years later he mote: “My music is the expression of the feeling of a true Sevillian who did not know Seville until he left it, de Turina (1906) and this is mathematics, yet it is necessary for the artist to move away to get to know his country, as for the painter who makes some steps backwards to be able to take in the complete picture.”

        What worried Turina most those first weeks in Paris was to take the correct directly in the musical aspect. His mate at the hostel, using his ability as a diplomatic, introduced him to a fellow countryman, very good friend of his and also excellent musician, Joaquín Nin. Nin thought that his teacher Moritz Moszkowsky had to be in charge of my artistic direction.

        Moszkowsky's lessons started on the 22nd of November 1905. The first lesson were excellent, but he soon found something in his teacher that he did not like and which he commented to his girlfriend (6th December): "I have told you nothing of Moszkowsky, because I wanted we be completely sure. but yesterday lesson made me see everything very clear, and I have to say that I am quite disappointed with him, regarding composition, as he wants me to stay in a vicious circle without any space to work.
        Yesterday evening, after dinner, I went to Saint-Cloud by train to talk to Nin, I also an student of d’Indy, to try to make a chance, to enter the Schola Cantorum under the direction of the above mentioned sir. But the problem is that I would like to continue with Moszkowsky's piano lessons, as everything is perfect in this respect”.
        From this reading, it is evident that Turina had enough with some lessons to understand that his theories were old-fashioned.

        Finally, the lessons al the Schola Cantorum became fact, as it was decided that they would start on the 15th of January, not with the director of the centre, Vincent d'Indy, but, initially, with the vice-director Auguste Serieyx, “as a preparation for the second course of d'Indy which I will start later on.”

         “I was with Nin at Serieyx's. This man, very kind, listened to my compositions, analysed them and the result was what I expected and what made me come to Paris: that to become a true compositor I need one thing: to be able to build a symphony, a quartet or a long piece well, but, on the contrary, he liked the short ones a lot.”

        Turina’s stay in Paris, which lasted physically until 1913, developed into a very intense lifestyle, totally devoted to his studies, being himself always on a second position regarding this studies and his work, and always to and for the music.

        His debut took place in the Aeolian, on the 29th of April 1907, in his double facet of interpreter and compositor. As a pianist he intervened together with the Parent Quartet in the performance of two quintets, one by Brahms and the other by César Franck. In the central part of the recital, Turina performed alone, as the interpreter of his Poema de las estaciones (Seasons Poem), piece composed at the beginning of that year.

        He had not savoured the congratulations achieved from this performance yet, when he obtained more applause from his second performance at the same theatre eight days later. In his second concert, where the compositor was going to be judged more than the interpreter Turina had put all his hopes and dreams, as it was going to be fundamental for his success as a compositor, the success of his Quinteto en sol menor (Quintet in g), the longest piece written by him up until then, which on that occasion was going to be performed for the first time.

        Once more, success was on his side and it was in Paris, that Paris of the beginning of the 20th century, which was known precisely as the European capital of music.

        This piece, which was quickly included in the best known chamber groups repertoire -Touche, Lejeune, Chamont, Bruselas, Parent-, was given a prize that same year in the Salón de Otoño (Autumn Hall). For this reason, it was interpreted again on the 3rd October at the Grand Palais of the Champs-Elysées.

        Once more, Turina was very lucky since the most glorious Spanish compositors attended that concert: Isaac Albéniz. The happy intervention by the author of Suite Iberia, al the end of the performance of the splendid Quinteto, motivated a total transformation of the Sevillian compositor's career. In one of the writings he sent to the press he explained how everything happened: “At the beginning of October of 1907, my first piece was performed for the first time al the Salón de Otoño in Paris: my Quintet for piano and strings. Once everybody was settled on the stage, and the violinist Parent with his how al the ready, we saw fat man with long black bear and a big hat entering very quickly and breathless. A minute later, and in a complete silence, the performance started. Soon afterwards, the far man turned to his neighbour, a young slim man, and asked him: "Is the author English?" "No, he isn't. He is from Seville", his neighbour answered, completely astonished. He followed the piece and after the Fuga (Fugue), the Allegro cam, and after that the Andante and then the Final (The End). Having just finished, the fat man, accompanied by the slim one, burst into the foyer and, extremely politely, pronounced his name: “Isaac Albéniz”.

        Half an hour later the three of us were walking arm in arm, grey in that Autumn sunset, and after crossing the Concorde square, we ended up in a pub al the Royal Street, and once there, before a champagne cup and some cakes, I suffered the most complete metamorphosis in my life. There, we talked about our hometown, about the music that looked to Europe, and I left the place with my ideas completely changed. We were three Spanish and in that cenacle, in a corner of Paris, we had to make great efforts for the national music and for Spain. I will never forget that scene, and I don’t think the slim man will either, who, by the way, was Manuel de Falla.”

        Another determination Albéniz had was his interest in publishing the Quinteto, which, with some resistance from the editors, he achieved without much effort. Turina recalled this topic on different occasions. “In one of my last visits he took me by my arm and said the following, to my great surprise: “This franckianan Quinteto is following to be published. I make it a matter of priority. But you have to promise that you will never write music like this again. You have to base your an on the popular Spanish songs, or Andalusian, since you are from Seville."

        Those words were decisive for me, they are a piece of advice that 1 nave tried to follow throughout my career and that I have always offered to the memory of that genius and unique man."

        With the publishing of the Quinteto, the author had to take a decision apparently useless, but that had an importance in the future. It is an old tradition that any musical work, especially when being published, is given an order number to be identified. Without any doubt, Turina decided that the Quinteto should be op. I. This meant that all his previous production, around 60 pieces, had to be completed forgotten, among which there were two of the three written in Paris, which were based on the acquired knowledge al the Schola.

        During the years that Turina stayed in Paris, his catalogue augmented to 10 works. As these pieces appeared, the scholastic print disappeared, to give way to the songs, the rhythms, the light and the cheerfulness of the region where he was born, without losing the value and musical equilibrium that the author acquired in the rooms of the Schola.

Once he had overcome the difficulty of becoming known in Paris, which Turina achieved with a highly positive result with his two first public performances, his prestige started to consolidate, which allowed him fend for himself in the musical world without any problem.

        The great attraction that the Spanish music had on the other side of the Pyrenees, was a circumstance that favoured Turina in an extraordinary way: Turina was not only frequently required for piano performances, interpreting his own music and that of his fellow men, but his collaboration was also requested for the organisation of many programmes where the Spanish music was a compulsory topic and that he assumed with great pleasure, since he was favouring the spreading of his Spanish colleagues work.

        In 1908, in family terms, Turina reached his complete happiness when he married Obdulia Garzón, happiness that was ratified with the birth of his first son two years later.

        1913 meant the end of the training at the old house in Saint-Jacques Street for the young musician. As a prize, he received his teacher the following certificate of studies, dated on the 4th of March:
        "Le soussigné, directeur de la Schola Cantorum, certifie que m. Joaquín Turina a suivi avec succès mes cours de Composition Musicale à la Schola et qu'il a acquis par ses études assidues, la science et le talent nécessaires par faire très bon compositeur.
        Il a, du reste, écrit déjà, un certain nombre d'oeuvres qui ont été exécutées dans les concerts parisiens et ont été fort remarquées.
        Je suis heureux de pouvoir donner, a mon excellent élève, ce témoignage de la sympathie et de l’amitié de son vieux maître.
                           Vincent d'Indy."

        That same month, on the 30th, La procesión del Rocío (The Rocío Procession) was performed for the first time at the Teatro Real, in Madrid, with a great success, which confirmed the good judgement of Turina by son vieux maître.

        From this moment on, he started having doubts about his definite placement: Paris? Madrid?

        The French capital had always been generous to him, which he never forgot, but on the other hand, he was much attracted to the blue sky of his country.

        Soon afterwards, these doubts were solved with the start of the First World War.

        IV. Madrid (1914-1949)

        Since 1914, Turina, definitively settled in Madrid (calle de Alfonso XI, number 5, nowadays number 7), began his composition work in the lyric genre, continuously collaborating with Gregorio Martínez Sierra, in this same year (¡914), Margot, op.11, appeared, a lyrical comedy in three acts that was performed for the first time on the 1Oth of October. After this there were Navidad (Christmas), op.13 (1916), La adúltera penitente (The Penitent Adulteress), op.l8 (1917), and Jardín de Oriente (Oriental Garden), op. 25 (1923). After this, he would never write for theatre again.

        On the 15th of January 1915, the Ateneo in Madrid presented in the same concert two young musicians that were practically unknown to the audience from the capital of Spain: Falla and Turina.

        Turina's career as a compositor, apart from the four already mentioned works for the stage, was centred on the symphonic, chamber, vocal genre and, especially, on the piano production, which contains more than 60 different titles.

        Turina’s life, both at work and at home, where there were five children running about, was totally stabilised in the 20s. The compositor had to work a lot to cover his multiple necessities. It is for the reason that, as he could nor live on his work, he always had to dedicate time to other jobs, which, though in the same musical field, had nothing to do with composition.

        In that period he intervened in hundreds of concerts and recitals, sometimes alone, with the piano; sometimes integrated in chamber groups and, many times, accompanied by singers (curiously always women), such as Aga Lahowska, mme. Vallin Pardo, Blanca Asorev, Crisena Galatti, or Lola Rodríguez Aragón. Some other times he could be seen before an orchestra: in 1916 he started the conduction of a small orchestra (14 musicians) of the Eslava theatre, with which he performed for the first time his works Navidad and La adúltera penitente, and also the pantomime of Manuel de Falla, El corregidor y la molinera (The Corregidor and the Miller's Wife) (7th April 1917), that would later turned into ballet with the same title as the work by Antonio Ruíz de Alarcón, El sombrero de tres picos (The Three-Cornered Hat), in which Martínez Sierra based his script for the pantomime.

        In 1918, and at Falla's sugestion, Serge Diaghilew asked the musician from Seville to conduct the orchestra of his ballet, the very famous Ballets rusos (Russian Ballets), which during the spring of 1918 went to sixteen different Spanish towns where they offered 47 performances. The last time that Turina did a job like this was at the end of that same year, when he conducted an orchestra with the very same name of the compositor, founded by the Centro de Hijos de Madrid, but which had an ephemeral life, only three concerts, because of economic problems.

        Turina never refused a job, particularly if it was to help a colleague; therefore he collaborated in the instrumentation of the zarzuela Doña Francisquita (Mrs Francisquita), by Amadeo Vives, performed for the first time in October 1923.

        The saddest thing of those years was when he became a member of the staff of the Teatro Real as a harmonizer, where he was employed for four seasons, from the one of 1920-1921. This job, very hard and demanding, despite being essential for his economy, was very inconvenient because it appeared just in the period when, as a compositor, Turina was at his best, which is confirmed by the appearance of Danzas fantásticas (Fantastic Dances), op.22, the Sinfonía sevillana (Symphony from Seville), op.23, and Sanlúcar de Barrameda, op.24.

        Turina also cultivated composition teaching, first in a private way and later, in 1931, from his chair at the Music Conservatory of Madrid.

        Another of his facets was the conferences on musical issues which were always accompanied by musical examples that he usually interpreted. Due to this he was I requested 20 lessons, at the beginning of 1920, by the Círculo de Bellas Artes and which were about the topic: "History of music and of musical forms". In 1929 he went to La Habana to satisfy a petition from the Institución Hispano-Cubana de Cultura, in that city he gave seven conferences which, due to their great success, he had to repeat (some of them) in other towns in the island. Before leaving that tropical land, he received an urgent cable from México signed by the rector of that university, pledging him to go to that capital to give a series of 1O conferences on Spanish music, petition that Turina could not satisfy.

        Those were not the only occasions when he talked in public, as this was a spreading method that he approved of. In another occasion, in September of 1941, he gave a technical short course for the teachers of the National Orchestra of Spain.

        A very important facet in the life of the musician was his lengthy parallelism between his true profession, the music, and journalism. He had worked as a journalist from 1910, collaborating with the Revista Musical de Bilbao, where his chronicles sent from Paris appeared.

        Since then, his signature appeared very frequently in many specialised journals, papers and other publications, both Spanish and French. Turina's journalism acquired a professional character from 1926, when he became a member of the staff of Editorial Católica, as a musical critic of El Debate. He was employed in this company, even after the disappearance of the above-mentioned paper, until 1936. In 1939, soon after the Spanish Civil War was over, he resumed his work as a critic, nor in El Debate, which never reappeared, but in Ya, which he left soon afterwards for Dígame, a weekly publication dedicated to shows, where Turina continued working until the end of his days.

        In literary terms, we should high light two works dedicated to music didactics. The first one, edited in 1917, is the Enciclopedia abreviada de la música (Brief Encyclopaedia of Music), with a prologue by Manuel de Falla, which starts by saying: “The publishing of the Enciclopedia abreviada de la música by Joaquín Turina constitutes something strange and extraordinary in the musical life of our country, where, except for the writings of Felipe Pedrell, there is nothing to be found in this sense and of similar importance.”

        As a result of his last years, he carried out the beginning of another didactic work, the Tratado de composición (Composition Treatise), which he left unfinished in not being able to finish the third volume due to his death.

        Despite every thing we have stated, the catalogue of Turinas works (which was made by him), augmented year after year -with the exception of the three years of civil war (1936-1939) when he did not compose a chord-, until reaching an important number of 104 titles (all of them edited), without including neither the production of his first period, nor many works written since 1907, which the author left aside, may be because they did not reach the artistic level he demanded from himself.

        Among the many evasiones (escapes) that Turina enjoyed, apart from reading and photography- which he always cultivated, he had the gatherings for coffee, the meetings, both at his place or al somebody else's (almost always with music); the walks with his family or his friends to the neighbouring park of El Retiro (without any hurry, without any direction); or alone in the Madrid of the Austrians. And, being from Seville, how he would not like the processional parades? He also enjoyed himself seeing, on this occasion accompanied by his children, any military manifestation: march-pasts, parades, and relieves. Also in the company of his children, he was very common to see him mingled with the children audiences at the circus, and with the noisy and cheerful ones of the fairs, where he only liked to get on the Big Wheel. In this list we should add his liking for the shows of revista musical (revue), (a kind of operetta), which he attended, often accompanied by the youngest of his children.

        Once the war was over in 1939, Spain started a life of recovery. In going through the names of the compositors there was an enormous void which created a difficult situation for those left behind. Among them there were two distinguished names: Falla and Turina, but the musician from Cádiz did not want to leave his Granadian carmen, so this made Turina be in charge, because of his age and prestige, of the situation. he was a pity the absence of a whole young generation that, for political reasons, was to be found spread out of Spain.

        Then, the situation for Turina was an enormous bulk that his body, which had been wounded for many years by an incurable illness that became worse day by day, could not cope with, unless he made an enormous sacrifice that he had to put up with until the end.

        To the multiple tasks that he had been doing until then, we have to add, since June, the one of becoming a member of a commission whose main aim was the reorganisation of the Conservatory, and months later the nomination of general commissioner of music, post that he had until his death.

        In this last period of his life where he accumulated so many occupations, as it was logical his production diminished, to the point that he only included 11 new works to his catalogue in nine years. The op.104, titled Desde mi Terraza (From my Terrace), was composed in 1947 and is the finishing touch to a catalogue as a symbol of a life completely devoted to music, to which he offered all his work, all his aims, all his dreams.

        Joaquín Turina died on the 14th of January- 1949.