I would agree that the Homenaje to the murdered poet Lorca was one of [Revueltas'] most significant achievements—a long trumpet-led lament curiously interspersed with vivid dance-like episodes ''like El Salon Mexico on mescal'', as Page remarks about the last of the enjoyably pungent (but also lyrical) Alcancias (perhaps ''expansive bullets'' though, bewilderingly enough, it can also mean ''piggy-banks'' or ''brothel keepers''!). These latter pieces are brilliantly played by the London Sinfonietta, which then sobers up for the austere Planos, which the composer described as ''functional architecture''. Ocho x rondo is a scherzo (with a gentler central section) for octet, perhaps more immediately striking is a Toccata from the same year (1933), which demands (and gets) virtuoso playing from a chamber group. Revueltas's best-known work, the snake-killing ritual Sensemaya, is taken by Mata at the same deliberate pace he adopted with the Bolivar Orchestra of Venezuela (Dorian, 11/93) but sounds more decorous at the hands of the New Philharmonia.

There is, however, nothing sedate, except, very properly, in the evocative and beautiful third movement (''Night in Yucatan''), about the performance by the Jalapa (or Xalapa) Symphony under Fuente (whose Sensemaya for Pickwick was reviewed in 12/93) of the four-movement suite drawn from the music for the film La noche de los Mayas: its finale, with an orgy of manic percussion and brass would almost rouse the dead (which presumably was the scene it accompanied). A fascinating disc.

-- Lionel Salter, Gramophone [2/1995]

Mexican composer Silvestre Revueltas possessed one of the most original and vital musical voices of the 20th century. He also led a wild life. Brilliant and quarrelsome, he was active in revolutionary politics, feuded with fellow artists such as Carlos Chavez and managed to write a substantial body of work in only ten years before his death from acute alcoholism at the age of forty.
The music is dynamic, fierce and colorful, influenced by Stravinsky and Bartók, modernist and imbued with folkloric flavor, though without actual quotation. Like the muralist Diego Rivera, Revueltas created a kind of mock-primitive, epic Mexico in his music, passionate and boldly etched (his best known work, the tone poem 'Sensemaya' is often referred to as a Mexican 'Rite of Spring.) This is an amazingly generous collection, including chamber works and film scores, the quasi-symphonic 'La Noche de los mayas' and not one but two versions of 'Sensemaya,' the bonus being the spirited (if rhythmically errant) debut recording made by Leopold Stokowski in 1947.

Sensemayá • La noche de los Mayas • La coronela

Silvestre Revueltas was born in Santiago Papasquiaro, Durango, a small town in the north of Mexico. As a child, he showed great interest in music, his early artistic bent apparent by 1906. When his family moved to Mexico City, he entered the National Conservatory of Music, studying the violin with José Rocabruna and composition with Rafael J. Tello.

In 1917 he moved to the United States to study at St Edward College in San Antonio, Texas, and later in Chicago, remaining there until 1924. After a rather long concert tour in Mexico and in the United States, he returned to his home country, where he remained from 1929 onwards. In 1929 Carlos Chávez offered him the position of assistant conductor of the Orquesta Sinfónica de México, which he held until 1936. Working together they were able to do much to promote Mexican music, offering a rich repertoire including works by the most outstanding and prominent names of the period. At the same time Revueltas began a very successful career as a prolific composer, activity which brought Cuauhnahuc (Cuernavaca) (1930), Esquinas (Corners) (1931), Ventanas (Windows) and Colorines (Coloured Beads) (1932), Janitzio (1933), Caminos (Roads) (1934), Homenaje a Federico García Lorca (Hommage to Federico García Lorca) (1936), Itinerarios (Routes) (1937) and Sensemayá (1938). This series of works constitutes a vivid example of his extraordinary contribution to the form of the national Mexican symphonic poem, with compositions that show his originality and freshness of inspiration, together with his technical mastery.

World-premiere recordings of early works that shed new light on a foundational figure in Mexican classical music. Until recently, it was widely believed that Silvestre Revueltas (1899-1940) only began composing in his thirties-during the final decade of a life tragically cut short by alcoholism and pneumonia. By the age of 39, he had already secured his place as the most important Mexican composer of his generation, with orchestral masterpieces such as Sensemay� and La noche de los Mayos: works notably less indebted to European models than those of his elders and contemporaries, including Carlos Ch�vez. The rediscovery of these manuscripts, as recently as 2024, reveals that Revueltas had in fact been composing from his teenage years, and that he was an accomplished pianist as well as a violinist. This pioneering album presents 24 piano pieces, none exceeding four minutes except for a two-movement Sonatina, with the longest being a Lento doloroso. Most date from 1915, when Revueltas studied at the National Conservatoire, though later works stem from his years in Chicago (1919) and 1924, when he wrote his final piano piece, a Satie-like caprice titled Tragedia en forma de r�bano (Tragedy in the Form of a Radish). Together, these works form a kind of musical diary, reflecting both the influence of his teachers, Manuel Ponce and Felipe Villanueva, and the emergence of a distinctly Mexican voice evolving between romanticism and modernism. Of Mexican and German heritage, pianist Rodolfo Ritter-professor at the Conservatoire in Mexico City-is a leading advocate for the music of his homeland. As performer, editor, and musicologist, he has premiered numerous works by Mexican composers while also performing the concerto repertoire from Chopin to Bart�k. His combination of scholarship and artistry makes him the ideal interpreter to bring these long-forgotten piano works by Revueltas to international attention.