Anton Garcia April

Born on May 19, 1933, Antón García Abril from Teruel  learned music theory thanks to his father, a musician in a band. “When they bought me a piano, I discovered another world.” He began his studies at the Valencia Conservatory and at the age of twenty went to continue his training at the Madrid Conservatory. There he trained with great teachers, such as Julio Gómez and Jesús Guridi, and has other relevant musicians as classmates, such as Carmelo Bernaola, Cristóbal Halffter or Luis de Pablo.

A defender of melody –contrary to the opinion of other creators of his time–, and inspired by popular music, he began in the cinema in 1956, creating the score for Torrepartida , a war drama directed by Pedro Lazaga . From that moment on, he did not stop putting music to films of all genres, especially comedy ( Sister Citroen , Abuelo Made in Spain , The city is not for me , Come to Germany, Pepe!, all of them again from Lazaga), but also in the documentary ( Franco, that man ), the western ( Goodbye, Texas ), terror ( Walpurgis Night  Doctor Jekyll and the werewolf, both starring Paul Naschy ) and drama ( The Hive , The Innocents ). In addition, Antón García Abril  composes some of the most remembered soundtracks in the history of Spanish television, such as El hombre y la Tierra , Curro Jiménez , Anillos de oro , Segunda enseñanza , and above all El hombre y la tierra , his work perhaps most remembered. “It took seven years of working side by side with Félix Rodríguez de la Fuente, where I tried by all means to try to give life to each of the animals that appeared ”, he recalled. “The reason is that it is not the same to see a fawn being born than a wolf that is attacking a sheep.” 

Despite lavishing himself for many years, from the 90s, Antón García Abril  barely dedicated himself to audiovisuals. “There came a time when maybe the directors thought my music wasn’t suitable for the movies they were making. And I didn’t look good in those movies either, so the movies left me and I left them. It was a love story that It’s over, and that’s it,” he recalled. “I received some invitation to go to Hollywood, but I had four children at an age when they still needed me and I have always been very attached to my land. I gave up going.” His work includes opera, compositions for orchestra, cantatas, concerts, chamber music and song cycles inspired by the most important Spanish poets.

He considered his masterpiece “Divine Words”, an opera based on the play by Ramón María del Valle-Inclán , with which the Teatro Real in Madrid was reopened and in which the Aragonese tenor Santiago Sánchez Jericó participated together with Plácido Domingo . “That’s where it all ended. I’m not astonished that it hasn’t been done again, even if it was in a more modest production. That makes me very sad,” he lamented in an interview.

Between 1974 and 2003,  Antón García Abril   was Professor of Composition and Musical Forms at the Royal Conservatory of Music of Madrid. In 1982 he was elected a member of the San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Madrid and in 2008 he was appointed a member of the San Carlos Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Valencia. Likewise, he is Honorary President of the Royal Academy of Nobles and Fine Arts of San Luis, in Zaragoza. He won the Spanish National Music Award and in 2006 the VII Tomás Luis de Victoria Ibero-American Music Award, considered the equivalent of classical music to Cervantes.

Established in Madrid, he returned to Aragon whenever he had the opportunity. In 1988 regional courts chose him to compose the music for the official hymn of Aragon, with lyrics by the poets Ildefonso Manuel Gil, Ángel Guinda, Rosendo Tello and Manuel Vilas. His “Cantos de pleamar” were chosen to inaugurate the Auditorio de Zaragoza in 1994.