Farruca, Op.45, No.1

No one knew better than Turina how to convert the songs and dances of the flamenco tradition to his own artistic use. The farruca is known to aficionados as an exclusively male dance, the macho associations of which make it an unlikely choice as the stylistic basis for a tribute to a great soprano. Turina’s Farruca, however - the first of the three songs of his Triptico to words by Compaomor and Rivas - was dedicated on its publication in 1929 to Conchita Supervia, the most famous Spanish singer of her generation. Known for the vehemence of her expression, she no doubt welcomed Turina’s use of the aggressive dance rhythms to emphasize the passion behind the words at the beginning and the end of the song, just as she would have relished the idiomatic authenticity of the extended vocal decorations and the poignant loneliness of the largely unaccompanied third stanza.