January 21, 1930

Introduced by Margarita de Mayo of the Spanish department as “one of the prominent younger Spanish poets and the initiator with the composer Manuel de Falla of the modern renaissance of Spanish popular song,” Federico Garcia Lorca lectured on “La Canción Española (The Folk-songs of Spain).” “When I am tired of cathedrals and monuments,” he told his audience, “I begin to search for and enjoy the living elements of Spain—her songs and her sweets.”

Playing and singing examples of Spanish songs from Granada and Asturias about the bogeyman, or côco—used to frighten children into sleep—Lorca said that the Spanish music of the people reflected geography, history and the wandering nature of Spanish popular culture. “A melodic map,” The Miscellany News reported, “might be made, showing the change of seasons. This map would also illuminate the invisible framework which binds the peninsula together.”