Morera, Enrique (Enric)

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Morera, Enrique (Enric)

Morera, Enrique (Enric), Spanish composer; b. Barcelona, May 22, 1865; d. there, March 11, 1942. As a child, he was taken to Argentina, and studied in Buenos Aires. He then took courses at the Brussels Cons. Returning to Barcelona, he studied piano with Albéniz and harmony with Felipe Pedrell. In 1895 he founded the choral society Catalunya Nova, which he conducted until 1909; then taught at the Escuela Municipal de Música in Barcelona (1910–28). He was an ardent propagandist of Catalan music, and wrote a number of songs to Catalan words; also collected 193 melodies of popular origin. His opera Emporium, originally to a Catalan text, was performed first in Italian (Barcelona, Jan. 20,1906). He wrote more than 50 other stage works (lyric comedies, zarzuelas, operettas, intermezzos, etc.), as well as several symphonic poems, including Introducció a l’ Atlántida (1893), Cello Concerto (1917), Poema de la nit i del dia for Orch. (1919), chamber music, much choral music, and many sardanas.

Bibliography

I. Iglesias, Enric M. (Barcelona, 1921); J. Pena, Enric M.. (Barcelona, 1937).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire