Exploring National And Cultural Identities in Sketches of Spain

In this talk I use the 1959 Columbia Release of Sketches of Spain (Miles Davis and Gil Evans) as a central point of analysis for discussing the diverse ways that culture, globalization, and inspiration interact. The album Sketches of Spain, is not music from Spain, or “Spanish Music” but it shows the diversity of ways that musical and cultural identities interact and change. Sketches of Spain is an album that highlights movement and migration, and the ways that power, and powerlessness, and pain and beauty and tradition all play into the way that people and groups of people move through a changing world. Every song on the album is inspired by something else, by the experiences of the players and of pieces and traditions move and change with the music. Because of this, each piece, and each performance carries a bit of those stories in it. By discussing the histories of place and individuals a deeper understanding of the Album itself as well as the musical landscape that it in turn has inspired. This research was done in conjunction with a performance by the Western Symphony Orchestra of the entire album of Sketches of Spain, along with the Concierto de Aranjuez (Joaquin Rodrigo - 1949) and three songs from El Amor Brujo (Manuel de Falla - 1915) that were part of the inspiration for the album