La Dolores

Tomás Bretón y Hernández (Salamanca, 1850-Madrid, 1923) was one of the great revitalising forces of Spanish music during the period of the Restauration. He composed in a wide variety of genres, including opera, zarzuela, symphonic and chamber music. He was always an ardent defender of the state of music in Spain, his noble ideals often being hostilely rejected.

His ideas regarding the renovation of music in Spain, which connected with contemporary regenerative thought, were insistently expounded in the capital’s main cultural forums, such as the Conservatorio –which he directed from 1901-1921, the Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, the Círculo de Bellas Artes and the Ateneo Artístico y Literario.

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Notas

G. Morphy: “La Dolores de Bretón”, La correspondencia de España, Madrid, 18.3.1895.

C. F. S.: “Veladas teatrales: Zarzuela”, La Época, Madrid, 13.3.1895.

G. Morphy: op. cit.

R. M. [E. Ruiz Morales]: “Los estrenos: La Dolores”, El País, Madrid, 17.3.1895.

G. Morphy: op. cit.

Guerra y Alarcón: “La Dolores”, Heraldo de Madrid, Madrid, 17.3.1895.

G. Morphy: op. cit.

Guerra y Alarcón: “La Dolores”, Heraldo de Madrid, Madrid, 17.3.1895.

Eme: “Teatro de la Zarzuela: La Dolores”, El Imparcial, Madrid, 17.3.1895.

Eme: op. cit.

E. Ruiz Morales: “La Dolores. Antes del estreno”, El País, Madrid, 16.3.1895.

Guerra y Alarcón: “La Dolores, Heraldo de Madrid, Madrid, 17.3.1895.

G. Morphy: op. cit.

Heraldo de Madrid, Madrid, 27.3.1895.

The work’s success quickly sparked parodies of the opera. The first was announced in the Madrilenian press barely five days after the première, titled La Primores, with a text by the journalists Curros and Quintana and music by Arnedo and Consuegra. The next day the same newspaper reported on a new parody, La Lola o la chica de Calatayud, with a libretto by Sr. Tolosa. The most famous parody was Dolores… de cabeza o El colegial atrevido, with a text by Salvador María Granés and music by Arnedo, premièred at the Teatro Apolo barely a month after the première of the opera.

Alfonso Carlos Saiz Valdivieso: Fleta, memoria de una voz, Madrid, Ediciones Albia, 1986, p. 148, 153.

La Dolores was incorporated into the repertory of the Liceo, and was later restaged more than 30 times: in 1922 with Hipólito Lázaro and Ofelia Nieto, in 1924 with Palet and Fiedla Campiña, in 1929 with Gaviria and Campiña, in 1931 again with Palet and Carmen Bau, in 1938 with Lázaro and Matilde Martín, in 1939 with Juan Rosich and Martín, in 1948 with Manuel Ausensi and Juana Luisa Gamazo, in 1959 with Miguel Sierra and María José Simo, in 1969 with Pedro Lavirgen and María Fernanda Acebal. The last performance took place in 1975 with Lavirgen and Mirna Lacambra, together with Vicente Sardinero, Cecilia Fondevilla and Dalmau González.

Reference no. TL-227. An analysis of this adaptation can be found in: Julio C. Arce Bueno: “Aproximación a las relaciones entre el teatro lírico y el cine mudo”, Cuadernos de música iberamericana, Madrid, S.G.A.E, vol. II-III, 1996-97, pp. 273-280. A later, more famous, cinematographic version was made in 1939 by CIFESA, directed by Florían Rey, starring Conchita Piquer, which used Bretón’s music, in combination with new songs by Guadalupe Martínez del Castillo and Manuel L. Quiroga, in a free adapatation of Feliú’s drama, which had nothing more to do with Bretón’s opera.

Jesús Rubio Jiménez: “El teatro en el siglo XIX (1845-1900)”, Historia del teatro en España, ed. José María Díez Borque, Madrid, Taurus, 1988, p. 684.

Juan Barco: VPI, pp. 80-81. Quoted in: Antonio Sánchez Portero: La Dolores: un misterio descifrado, Calatayud, 1987, p. 101.

José Yxart: El arte escénico en España, Barcelona, Editorial Alta Fulla, 1987, p. 218.

Antonio Sánchez Portero: La Dolores: un misterio descifrado. Historia de una copla que se convirtió en leyenda, Calatayud, 1987.

Tomás Bretón: La Dolores, Madrid, Administración Lírico-Dramática, 1895.

E. Ruiz Morales: “La Dolores. Antes del estreno”, El País, Madrid, 16.3.1895.

A second edition, in addition to that cited above, was “La Dolores. Argumento de la ópera española en 3 acto, arreglada sobre el drama del mismo título original de D. José Feliú y Codina, letra y música de D. Tomás Bretón”, Valladolid, Celestino González, 1903.

This manuscript has recently been acquired by the Biblioteca Nacional, where it has been deposited.