Ignacio de Jerusalem (3 June 1707 - 15 December 1769) was a composer of Novohispanic Baroque music.
Jerusalem was born Ignazio Gerusalemme on June 3, 1707 in Lecce, Italy. His father was Matteo Gerusalemme, a Neapolitan who had moved to Lecce in 1689 to become chapel master. One of eleven children, Jerusalem studied the violin extensively in Italy before moving in 1732 to the Spanish port city of Cádiz. Establishing himself as a virtuoso of the instrument, he performed regularly at the Coliseo de Cádiz, the city's preeminent theatre. Jerusalem was soon known as the "musical marvel" for his uncanny musical talents.
In 1742, Josef Cárdenas, the administrator of the Royal Hospital of Indigenous Citizens in Mexico City, arrived in Cádiz to recruit talent for the Coliseo de México, a theatre whose proceeds supported the hospital. Cárdenas reasoned that better talent would lead to bigger theatre audiences and more funds for the hospital. He persuaded a number of music and dance talents, including Jerusalem, to return to Mexico City with him to perform at the theatre.
Jerusalem began directing the musical activities at the Coliseo de México soon after he arrived. By 1746, he was earning commissions from the Catedral de México and teaching at the Colegio de Infantes (Infants College). In 1749, the cathedral ended the tenure of its lackluster chapel master, Domingo Dutra, and announced it would seek a more able leader. Jerusalem auditioned for the post. The jury, steeped in traditional musical forms, resisted the modernity and eclecticism of his compositions but ultimately confirmed him as the new chapel master on November 3, 1750, a position Jerusalem held for the rest of his life.
The following decade proved tumultuous for Jerusalem: he became embroiled in a lawsuit with the tenant of the Coliseo, Joseph Calvo; his estranged wife, Doña Antonia de Estrada, petitioned the cathedral to garner his wages; he used his position to prevent musicians in other parishes from taking job opportunities from musicians in his parish; and he acquired a professional rival in Matheo Tollis della Rocca, who later succeeded Jerusalem as chapel master.
Yet Jerusalem counted a number of triumphs during this time: he modernized musical notation by cathedral copyists; he improved the quality of texts used in compositions of sacred music; he more than doubled the size of the cathedral orchestra; and he composed prolifically.
When he died on December 15, 1769, Jerusalem was highly esteemed by his colleagues and the musical community of Mexico City. Along with other mid-century transplants from Spain, Jerusalem helped establish the Italianate galant style in Mexico, displacing older Spanish-style music; contrary to popular belief, he did not pay any attention to the native folk songs and instruments of Mexico. His compositions circulated widely throughout New Spain (present-day Mexico) and Guatemala, reaching as far north as the California missions, where it found a place alongside the much simpler "California mission style" music.
The music of Mexico is highly diverse, featuring a wide range of musical genres and performance styles. It has been influenced by a variety of cultures, primarily deriving from Europeans, Indigenous, and Africans. Music became an expression of Mexican nationalism starting in the nineteenth century.
The music of Guatemala is diverse. Music is played all over the country. Towns also have wind and percussion bands that play during the lent and Easter-week processions as well as on other occasions. The marimba is an important instrument in Guatemalan traditional songs. The oldest documented use of marimba in the Americas dates to 1680 during celebrations at Santiago de los Caballeros de Guatemala.
Hernando Franco was a Spanish composer of the Renaissance, who was mainly active in Guatemala and Mexico.
Manuel de Zumaya or Manuel de Sumaya was perhaps the most famous Mexican composer of the colonial period in New Spain. His music represented the pinnacle of the Baroque in the New World. He holds the distinction of being the first person in the Western Hemisphere to compose an Italian-texted opera, entitled Partenope. Similar to Antonio Vivaldi, Zumaya was also a lifelong, active Roman Catholic priest.
The villancico or vilancete was a common poetic and musical form of the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America popular from the late 15th to 18th centuries. Important composers of villancicos were Juan del Encina, Pedro de Escobar, Francisco Guerrero, Manuel de Zumaya, Juana Inés de la Cruz, Gaspar Fernandes, and Juan Gutiérrez de Padilla.
Portugal has a long music history, beginning around the year 600 C.E, which accompanied and strongly contributed to the development of the music history in Europe.
Miguel Bernal Jiménez was a Mexican composer, organist, teacher, and musicologist.
Julio Estrada Velasco is a composer, theoretician, historian, pedagogue, and interpreter.
Giacomo Facco was an Italian Baroque violinist, conductor and composer. One of the most famous Italian composers of his day, he was completely forgotten until 1962, when his work was discovered by composer, conductor, and musicologist Uberto Zanolli.
Gaspar Fernandes (1566–1629) was a Portuguese-Mexican composer and organist active in the cathedrals of Santiago de Guatemala and Puebla de los Ángeles, New Spain.
Cuban musical theatre has its own distinctive style and history. From the 18th century to modern times, popular theatrical performances included music and often dance as well. Many composers and musicians had their careers launched in the theatres, and many compositions got their first airing on the stage. In addition to staging some European operas and operettas, Cuban composers gradually developed ideas which better suited their creole audience. Characters on stages began to include elements from Cuban life, and the music began to reflect a fusion between African and European contributions.
Alan Estrada Gutiérrez is a Mexican actor, dancer and singer. His best known role was "Mario" in the Spanish musical Hoy No Me Puedo Levantar. He is also known for his YouTube channel Alan X El Mundo, documenting his world travels.
Claudio José Domingo Brindis de Salas Garrido was a Cuban concert violinist. His father was the violinist and bandleader, Claudio Brindis de Salas. The son surpassed his father, and was a violinist of world renown. He studied under his father, and then with maestros José Redondo and the Belgian José Van der Gutch. In 1863 he first performed in public, in Havana, with Van der Gutch as accompanist. Ignacio Cervantes also played at the same function.
Juan Navarro of Seville, hence the epithet Hispalensis, Marchena c. 1530 – Palencia 25 September 1580) was a Spanish composer. He is not related to the Mexican composer Juan Navarro Gaditanus,.
Armonicus Cuatro is a group of four vocalists from Mexico: Mario Iván Martínez, Lourdes Ambriz, Nurani Huet and Martín Luna which mostly specializes in European medieval, Renaissance and Baroque music. All four are established musicians in their own right, with Martínez also known as an actor in film and Mexican television. The group has performed widely in Mexico at music and cultural festivals such as the Festival Internacional Cervantino as well as in Europe.
Blas Tardío de Guzmán was a Bolivian criollo composer, one of four notable criollo students of Juan de Araujo. He succeeded Juan Guerra y Biedma as chapelmaster, maestro de capilla, of the Cathedral of Sucre, then called La Plata, in 1745.
Alonso Xuárez, (1640–1696), born in Fuensalida, Toledo, Spain, renowned musician of the Spanish Baroque, and a disciple of Tomás Miciezes el mayor in the Convent of Las Descalzas Reales of Madrid. He worked as chapel master in the cathedrals of Cuenca and Seville.
Juan Antonio Simarro González, stage name Juan Antonio Simarro, is a Spanish composer, interpreter and producer.
Antonio de Juanas was a composer in Spain and Mexico.
Francisco José Olivares was a Spanish composer and organist who lived in the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century. Throughout his musical career, he worked in Cuenca, Orihuela and Salamanca.