Life and Career
He was born in Barcelona, where he held conducting posts at the Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona and the Gran Teatre del Liceu. He studied composition with Enrique Morera at the Barcelona Conservatory, then went to Germany, where he studied in Berlin with Max Trapp, and also with Richard Strauss, taking five of Strauss's seminars. In 1948 his opera El mozo que caso con mujer brava premiered in Barcelona. In 1951, he emigrated to the United States, where he became a successful composer for the dance. He became a U.S. citizen in 1959. He composed three ballet scores for the renowned choreographer Martha Graham: Embattled Garden (1958), Acrobats of God (1960) and The Owl and the Pussycat (1978). He also composed for the Joffrey Ballet (Feast of Ashes). His harp concerto was commissioned by Charles Royce for his daughter Maria. The premiere was in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in 1978, with Nicanor Zabaleta playing. The concerto was then performed by maria Royce at Interlochen. The Surinach harp concerto added richly to the harp concerto repertoire; but, unfortunately, it has not been played since.
Surinach also orchestrated part of Isaac Albéniz's piano suite Iberia.
His notable students include Louis W. Ballard.
The BMI Foundation sponsors The Carlos Surinach Awards and Commissioning Programs, which recognizes talented emerging young musicians for their service to American music and funds the creation of new works by former winners of the BMI Student Composer Awards. The program was established by a bequest from Surinach.
The final "ch" in Surinach's surname is pronounced "k", following ancient Catalan orthography (in modern orthography this phoneme is rendered with a "c"). The "ch" ending is commonly found in Catalan surnames, many of which retain this spelling. Also, before Surinach left Spain, his surname was spelled "Suriñach", with a tilde over the "n". He eventually dropped this tilde, but saw the original spelling used on concert posters whenever he visited Spain.
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