La Paloma: A Song History

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"La Paloma" ("The Dove") is the work of the Basque composer Sebastián de Iradier, whose surname is often printed as Yradier; he was born in Lanciego, Álava, in 1809 and died in Vitoria in 1865.[1][2][3] He started out as a church organist, winning a post at Salvatierra in 1827, and later taught at the Madrid Conservatory.[3][2] He eventually settled in Paris as a singing teacher, and the Costa Rican daily La Nación reports that Empress Eugenia de Montijo was among those he taught there.[2][1] A spell in Cuba brought him into contact with the habanera, the rhythm on which "La Paloma" is built.[3][1] Reference works date the song to 1859, and IMSLP lists a first edition published that year in Madrid by E. A. Gil.[2][3][4]

Billowing white clouds over a low line of palm trees in northern Cuba

Charles Dewolf Brownell, Sky – Northern Cuba, oil on academy board, ca. 1853–66. A Cuban sky of the song's era, shown for the habanera's Cuban roots; it has no connection to the song.

According to La Nación, Iradier ended his days in deep poverty and drew no financial reward from the song, which Mexicans came to treasure so much that many long regarded it as their own.[1] The same article relays stories tying it to Mexico's imperial couple, including a popular legend that Emperor Maximilian asked to hear it as a last wish before his execution.[1] Printed arrangements multiplied abroad; IMSLP's list includes a piano version issued in Boston by the Oliver Ditson company in 1877.[4] Sousa's Band, conducted by Arthur Pryor, recorded it for Victor in Camden, New Jersey, on June 7, 1901.[5] Singers as different as Bing Crosby, Elvis Presley, Maria Callas and Harry Belafonte have taken it up since.[1]

A piece titled "La Paloma" appears, scored in four parts, in Kirk House and Judy House's The Whole Is Greater Than The Sum Of Its Parts, Book 1, a book of ensemble arrangements of eleven tunes, each in three to seven parts, published by the Houses themselves.[6]

Our book that contains the song "La Paloma"

Sources

  1. La Nación (Costa Rica): "'La paloma': la canción del olvido que hace historia".
  2. Visuotinė lietuvių enciklopedija: "Sebastián de Iradier".
  3. AllMusic: "Sebastián Yradier: Biography".
  4. IMSLP: "La paloma (Yradier, Sebastián)".
  5. Discography of American Historical Recordings: "Victor matrix [Pre-matrix B-]3437. La paloma / Sousa's Band".
  6. Judy House And Kirk House: "The Whole Is Greater Than The Sum Of Its Parts, Book 1".
  7. Image: Charles Dewolf Brownell, Sky – Northern Cuba, oil on academy board, ca. 1853–66. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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