L'illa misteriosa - Doble Concert

An unforgettable memory from my adolescence was reading the book The Mysterious Island by Jules Vernes; I read the book shortly after seeing the film directed by Cy Endfield, whose soundtrack was composed by Bernard Herrmann. This music made a great impression on me, in the same way that reading the book did.
Many years later, and at the suggestion of Alfons Reverté, I recovered these distant memories and decided to use them to compose a work for Saxophone and Percussion soloists and orchestra.
The work is written in a single movement and is organised around three extracts from the novel: The balloon and the arrival, Settlers and Granite House and The cave – The secret. The first originates in the journey, translated musically by the continuous movement. In the second, the expansions of timbre are a reference to the image of light that penetrates the bowels of the earth.
And finally the third, a more turbulent section, is suggested by the fantastic underwater landscape inhabited by the mysterious Captain Nemo.
Although this is not a descriptive work, the different imaginary landscapes are a reference point for the development of the work, combining both the characteristics of the symphonic poem and those of the concerto works.
This work was first performed in the Auditori Municipal Enric Granados (Enric Granados Municipal Auditorium) in Lleida on 18 February 2007. It was performed by saxophonist Ramón Álvaro with Esteve Espinosa on percussion and the Julià Carbonell Symphonic Orchestra of Lleida, conducted by Alfons Reverté.

Jesús Rodríguez Picó