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(Thomas Echeverra Elosegui), a leading composer of Basque music. Father Hilario stud- ied counterpoint and composition with Father Donostia, which served mainly to better himself in his musical training, learning about the latest pieces of modern music that Father Donostia heard in the Parisian musical season, all of which significantly influenced his work to compile popular Basque melodies. From 1918 to 1936, Father Hilario worked as professor of piano and French at the college of Lekaroz 18 . During his time at college, he learned the Basque language 19 , so that he could be understood more easily by students. With the students at the college, he cre- ated the first academy of txistu, and it is here that he writes his first method for txistu 20 . He managed the music for the school’s band, which resulted in many of his works for band, choir, orchestra, piano, and txistu. Beginning in 1922, Father Hilario began his work to ex- plore, investigate, and collect the music of Navarre by visiting with the best instrumen- talists of the txistu in the region, and collecting their repertoire; in this work, he acquired a deep knowledge of this music, which is reflected in his own compositions. In 1925, Father Hilario moved to the French Benedictine monastery of Solesmes, where he studied Gregorian chant and organ accompaniment. The same year, he pub- lished his first piano piece, Mutil-dantza Baztán , inspired by the folklore of Navarre. This composition was followed by others, for example, the piano works, Baile de la Era de Estella , Ingurutxo Leiza , Danzas de Baztán , Dantza-sonu , and Yoku-dantzak . Additional works composed during this time are those for three txistus with tamboril (percussion)— Eguberria , Mixintxo , Litxu , Txoriak , Arkaitzak , and Edurne —and vocal pieces, such as Done Bartolometan , with Basque lyrics written by his brother, Agustín, and the Prayer to the Virgin of the Puy . Father Hilario went on to write compositions for organ, several Masses, the pieces called Infantiles , for beginning pianists, and the piano and vocal work, Gimnasia de Lekaroz , to accompany the students’ gymnastic exercises. Undoubtly the most well known work of Father Hilario is his Método de Txistu y tamboril , the first of its kind, published in the journal Txistulari , in 1929 21 . This method has been reissued sev- eral times. In 1972, the Provincial Government of Navarra published another of his im- portant treatises, the Tratado de txistu y gaita (Pamplona: Diputación Foral de Navarra, Dirección de Turismo, Bibliotecas y Cultura Popular, 1972). Exile in Chile As a result of the Spanish Civil War, Father Hilario was expelled from the country on 31 October 1936, and relocated to Chile, where for twenty-seven years he devoted himself to the activity of a priest. He initially went to Chile as a missionary, where he carried out religious work in the field, in the Andes Mountains, on the shores of the Pacific Ocean, and on the margins of the rivers, from the Aconcagua to the Bío-Bío. Veteran artists in the region only practiced the txistu and tamboril, which turned out to be of great assistance to his mission and the religious instruction he provided. In Santiago, he had a small organ, made by the French organ builder, Aristide Cavaillé- Coll (1811–1899), which consisted of a single keyboard and pedals, with eight-foot stops. At the insistence from some friends, he gave several lectures on music and choreography, CATALOG I NG MUS I CAL WORKS OF FATHER H I LAR I O OLAZARÁN OF ES TEL LA 45 18. See note 14. 19. Non Indo-European language spoken in territories of Spain and France. 20. See note 14. 21. M. Ojarbide, “The Txistu, What it is and how it Touches”, Ibis Poitiers Sud 6 (1929): 3.
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