Sofía Noel, birth name Sophie Heyman, (1915–2011) was a Belgian-born Spanish soprano and

ethnomusicologist Ethnomusicology is the multidisciplinary study of music in its cultural context. The discipline investigates social, cognitive, biological, comparative, and other dimensions. Ethnomusicologists study music as a reflection of culture and investiga ...

who specialized in

Sephardic music Sephardic music is an umbrella term used to refer to the music of the Sephardic Jewish community. Sephardic Jews have a diverse repertoire the origins of which center primarily around the Mediterranean basin. In the secular tradition, material is u ...

. After leaving Belgium to escape Nazi persecution, she settled in

Barcelona Barcelona ( ; ; ) is a city on the northeastern coast of Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second-most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within c ...

where she worked with the composer

Fernando Obradors Fernando (Ferran) Jaumandreu Obradors (1897–1945) was a Spanish composer. Obradors was taught piano by his mother, but taught himself composition, harmony and counterpoint. He became conductor of the Gran Canaria Philharmonic Orchestra, and la ...

. Shortly before his death in 1943, she sang to the accompaniment of the pianist

Ricardo Viñes Ricardo Viñes y Roda (, , ; 5 February 1875 – 29 April 1943) was a Spanish pianist. He gave the premieres of works by Ravel, Debussy, Satie, Falla and Albéniz. He was the piano teacher of the composer Francis Poulenc and the pianists M ...

. In addition to singing and promoting Sephardic music, Noel also recorded Spanish songs from the Middle Ages, including those related to the country's Jewish and Arabic heritage.

Biography

Born in Brussels, Belgium, as Sophie Heyman in 1915, she was the daughter of a

Sephardic Sephardic Jews, also known as Sephardi Jews or Sephardim, and rarely as Iberian Peninsular Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population associated with the historic Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) and their descendant ...

father and an

Ashkenazi Ashkenazi Jews ( ; also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim) form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora, that Ethnogenesis, emerged in the Holy Roman Empire around the end of the first millennium Common era, CE. They traditionally spe ...

mother. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, she escaped persecution by the Nazis by moving to Spain where she settled in Barcelona, changing her name first to Sophie Noël and later to Sofía Noel. She performed in the last concert of

in February 1943, singing to his piano accompaniment in the city's

Palau de la Música Catalana Palau de la Música Catalana (, ) is a concert hall in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Designed in the Catalan ''modernisme, modernista'' style by the architect Lluís Domènech i Montaner, it was built between 1905 and 1908 for Orfeó Català, a ...

. With the support of

, she performed in concerts on the island of

Gran Canaria Gran Canaria (, ; ), also Grand Canary Island, is the third-largest and second-most-populous island of the Canary Islands, a Spain, Spanish archipelago off the Atlantic coast of Northwest Africa. the island had a population of that constitut ...

in the mid-1940s. Keen to present the history of Sephardic music, she participated in several radio programmes where she presented the results of her musicological research while singing pertinent songs herself. In particular, from the 1970s she presented the

Radio Clásica Radio Clásica is a Spanish free-to-air radio station owned and operated by Radio Nacional de España (RNE), the radio division of state-owned public broadcaster Radiotelevisión Española (RTVE). It is the corporation's second radio station, and ...

series ''La vida en música'' and ''Los Pueblos Cantan su vida''. In her recitals, Noel also presented other songs from the Middle Ages including songs in Hebrew and Yiddish as well as songs of Arabic origin. Her objective was to present the forgotten culture of Spain, in what she referred to as the "Spain of Three Cultures": Spanish, Jewish and Arabic. Noel continued to lecture on Sephardic musical traditions until a few months before her death. Of particular note are the songs she performed on

Radio Nacional de España Radio Nacional de España (acronym RNE, branded rne, "National Radio of Spain") is the national Government-owned corporation, state-owned public service broadcasting, public service radio broadcaster in Spain. RNE is the radio division and T ...

as well as those she sang to the accompaniment of the guitarist Pierre Élie Mamou. Sofía Noel died in Madrid on 27 December 2011.

References

External links

Sofía Noel discography from Discogs
{{DEFAULTSORT:Noel, Sofia 1915 births 2011 deaths Belgian Sephardi Jews Belgian sopranos Belgian folklorists Spanish folklorists Spanish women folklorists Spanish folk musicians Belgian ethnomusicologists Spanish ethnomusicologists Women ethnomusicologists