El decameron negro

• El decameron negro is a set of three “ballads” for guitar. Brouwer wrote the set in 1981.¹
• Brouwer describes his composition in this work, and others of this period, as “national Hyper-Romantic.”²
• Brouwer composed this piece for American guitarist Sharon Isbin.³
• This work is based on The Black Decameron, a book of African legends by the anthropologist Leo Frobenius.⁴

Movements 

1. El arpa del guerrero (The Harp of the Warrior)
2. La huida de los amantes (The Flight of the Lovers)
3. Balada de la doncella enamorada (The Ballad of the Love-Sick Maiden)⁵

1. Victoria Eli Rodríguez, “Brouwer (Mezquida), Leo,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed February 11, 2022, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000004092.
2. Steven Thachuk, liner notes to Leo Brouwer: Guitar Music, Vol. 2, Elena Papandreou, Naxos 8.554553, CD, 2001.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.