Fernando Sor's Biography

Fernando Sor was born on February 14, 1778 in Barcelona, Spain. He was a composer and a guitarist. In Spain he was known as the "Beethoven of the Guitar." Born to a fairly well-off family, Fernando Sor was descended from a long line of career soldiers, and intended to continue that legacy, but was distracted from this when his father introduced him to Italian Opera. He fell in love with music and abandoned a military career. Along with opera, Sor's father also introduced him to the guitar, which, at that time, was little more than an instrument played in taverns, thought to be inferior to orchestral instruments.

He studied music at Santa María de Montserrat where he wrote his first pieces of music for the guitar. Once his father died, his mother couldn't afford to pay for his studies and withdrew him from the school.

Sor was originally opposed to the Napoleonic invasion of Spain, but later he accepted a position under the French government and was, in consequence, obliged to seek refuge abroad, in London, and in Paris, where he established himself as a successful performer, teacher and composer. In 1808, when Napoleon invaded Spain, he began composing nationalistic music for the guitar, often accompanied by patriotic lyrics.After the defeat of the Spanish army, Sor accepted an administrative post in the occupying government. After the Spanish repelled the French in 1813 Sor and many other artists and aristocrats who had befriended the French left Spain for fear of retribution. He went to Paris, and never returned to his home country again.

He began to gain renown in the Parisian art community for his skills of composition and for his ability at playing the guitar, and eventually began touring across Europe, gaining considerable fame. In1827, due partly to his advancing age, he settled down and decided to live out the rest of his life in Paris. It was during his retirement that he composed many of his better works.
Sor published a quantity of music for guitar, some of it pedagogical in purpose and some of it for concert performance. His Méthode pour la guitarre, published in 1830, is among the most important books on guitar technique. He also wrote a number of boleros and seguidillas for voices and guitar, in addition to Spanish, Italian and English songs and duets for voice and piano. His opera Telemaco nell'isola de Calipso (Telemachus on the Island of Calypso) was staged in Barcelona in 1797. Sor's other theatre music was principally for the ballet, including a successful Cendrillon (Cinderella), a march from which he arranged for guitar.

His last work was a mass in honor of his daughter, who died in 1837. Her death sent the already sickly Sor into serious depression, and he died a miserable man on the 10th of July in 1839 of tongue and throat cancer.

Sor is considered one of the most important figures of his time in the classical guitar world and like many other guitar composers he promoted the guitar as a concert instrument during his life.