Let's continue to advance the idea of adding additional chapters to our traditional Great American Songbook. I'm calling it the Great Americas Songbook.
Yesterday, there was talk of a song book, but not even a hint of a song to be sung. When the Mexican composer Manuel Ponce first heard the melody "Estrellita" in his mind, he hurriedly wrote it on the back of a receipt from a Mexico City restaurant. From there, he turned it into an instrumental melody, and it was not until a bit later that he converted "Estrellita" little star into a melody and harmony with words to be sung. This performance by Ailyn Pérez and the guitarist Xuefei Yang of Manuel Ponce's "Estrellita" proves the universality of this simple yet compelling song.
Soprano Ailyn Pérez is evidence of our American continents, south, central and north as a melting pot. Ms. Perez is the daughter of Mexican immigrants. She was born in Chicago, attended the Indiana University School of Music and the Philadelphia Academy of Vocal Arts. She is a true artist who sings in many different languages. When the chance to sing at the Metropolitan Opera in Spanish was offered to her, she leapt at the opportunity. It wasn't just the Met... it was a chance to write history. When Ailyn Pérez sang the title role in Daniel Catán's "Florencia en el Amazonas" in December of 2023, the production was the first opera in the Spanish language to be sung at the Met in over a century.
At the persistent urging by Andrea Catán, widow of the composer Daniel Catán, Met general manager Peter Gelb and music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, saw The value of Spanish being sung at the Met. Here's what Nézet-Séguin said about "Florencia":
"'Florencia' is all about being in motion, because the whole opera, almost the whole opera, is on a ship. So that means that everything flows. It sounds sometimes like Puccini, sometimes like Strauss. What strikes me, even if I never met Daniel Catán, is that, clearly this is a man who loved opera, knew operatic history, and knew how to use the best of the qualities, the dramatic and orchestration and lyrical qualities of all the great composers of opera and make it into his own, to have a quintessentially Latin sound in opera. It's poetry."
This always sends a chill down my spine every time I hear the broad singing lines of Daniel Catán. The same is true throughout "Florencia." When I saw the Met's production live at Lincoln Center, I attest that I was not the only one in the sold out house with tears in their eyes when Florencia sang her final aria.
I hope you will agree that there is surely room in our Great Americas Songbook for "Florencia" and for the artistry of musicians such as Ailyn Pérez . I'm James Baker, thanks for listening, and don't forget, there are more Hispanic Heritage moments every weekday afternoon at 2 p.m. on KPAC 88.3 FM. Please encourage your friends to listen in.
