Description
La Virgen de La Macarena was the patron saint of Macarena in Seville, Spain, to whom the matadors would pray to before entering the arena. La Virgen de La Macarena is a traditional bullfighting song made famous by the great trumpet virtuoso Rafael Méndez. The solo lines could be changed with your own embellishments should you wish?
My father was a fan of the majestic (but cruel) sport of bullfighting, strange, as there was very little of this sport in Liverpool in the 1960’s apart from watching Tommy Smith play for Liverpool FC at the time? He admired the bull’s physique and mind set in no fear! As an amateur trumpet player he also paired this in buying records of the music from the bull ring, this was my first introduction to this style and this particular piece at the age of 13/14 trying to produce a vibrato as big and sound as bold.
As the bull and the matador meet, and as in the tradition of playing this mighty solo as we go on, the embellishments on the tune become more ornate and technically more challenging as we move through the piece. I merged the idea, 2 foes, 2 cornets, in a duel, a stand-off as each one delivers and more and more complicated decoration in answer to that the other has delivered, and topping the opponent. You’ll need a couple of Clint Eastwood’s on cornet for this stand-off!
