Sometimes called the “Spanish Scarlatti”, Manuel Blasco de Nebra has been forgotten for two centuries, before the first manuscripts and editions of his remaining 30 keyboard pieces were brought to light. Not much is known about his short life. His father was the organist of Seville Cathedral before he took over the position in 1778. Renowned for his excellent sight-reading and playing of the organ, harpsichord and fortepiano as well as his improvising skills, his works evoke Scarlatti’s concise forms – he also uses the binary form, usually an adagio followed by a fast finale – and extraordinary power of invention.

Nonetheless, he took the potentially pianistic qualities of the music further than his predecessor and his contemporaries like Carlos Seixas or Antonio Soler (who he might have met). In his book The Sonata in the Classic Era, William S. Newman studies the pre history of the Viennese Classical Sonata from 1730 to 1820, identifying Sevilla as an important manufacturing center for harpsichords and pianos. The first Spanish pieces written for piano were written in Sevilla. This may explain the inner expressiveness of particularly the adagio movements that Blasco de Nebra managed to reach by exploring the possibilities of these new instruments. Indeed, the title of the two Sonatas chosen from this programme employ the expression “Clave y Fuerte Piano” – meaning they could be performed on both instruments, harpsichord and pianoforte. One must realize that towards the end of the century the two instruments stood side by side in musical salons and concert halls – Scarlatti had already worked with both instruments while he was active in Spain and some Viennese composers such as Beethoven in his early sonatas also mentioned both instruments. Even if Blasco de Nebra was more familiar with the expressive devices of the harpsichord – whose tone color closely interwined with the crisp and transparent style of his Sonatas – some highest and lowest tones in these pieces exceed the range of the baroque instrument, suggesting the use of the piano instead.

On another technical point, it is interesting to mention that the notation of some of his ornamentation, in particular the notation of the grace note, refers to the characteristic Italian notation, that is also found in the music of Mozart, who was greatly influenced by Italian music, as were other Southern German and Austrian composers.

What comes through the two chosen Sonatas for this programme, is that he texture of Blasco de Nebra’s writing has one foot in the ornamented and expressive Baroque style while anticipating the Classical era of Haydn and Mozart in their clarity of phrase structure and harmonic simplicity. In some Sonatas however, he goes even further developing a harmonic world that can be a richly mysterious one, which has led some commentators to say his music at moments sounds like Chopin’s, Schubert’s or Schumann’s.