La Puerto del vino

One of the most important musical genres to emerge from the Caribbean is the habanera. Tonight we hear an instrumental habanera, one of many written by late-19th and early-20th century composers. Claude Debussy’s La puerta del vino (1913), from his second book of Préludes for solo piano, strides confidently, even aggressively onto the scene. The story goes that Debussy wrote “The Wine Gate” immediately upon receiving a picture postcard of the Alhambra palace from Manuel de Falla. What matters here is not the gate itself, but the scene of turbulent movement which unfolds in the square outside the palace: all the rapid changes from bravado to languor are depicted. The unifying element, which weaves in and out of the foreground, is the distinctive habanera rhythm. Despite the fact that its most popular instance occurs in a Spanish opera by a French composer (Bizet’s Carmen), the habanera actually comes from Cuba. What began as the Cuban contradanza, using African rhythmic motifs, only got its familiar name once the rest of the world—including Debussy—fell in love with its sensuous pulse.

(c) Jason Stell