Named after the twelve-sided ‘golden’ tower that dominates the River Guadilquivir in Seville, La Torre del Oro is the latest album from Christina Pluhar’s ensemble L’Arpeggiata. Tracing and mixing the musical cross-currents that run between Spain and Central and South America – Mexico, Venezuela, Argentina and Chile – it takes the 1500s as the starting point for a captivating journey that reaches the modern day. For La Torre del Oro singers Céline Scheen, Luciana Mancini and Vincenzo Capezzuto join the 13 instrumentalists of L’Arpeggiata, led by Christina Pluhar on the theorbo. Among the other instruments to be heard are baroque guitar and harp, Venezuelan cuatro (a guitar with just four strings) and harp, cornetto, harpsichord, accordion and maracas. 

In the Renaissance and Baroque eras Seville, already a cultural melting pot, became Spain’s principal port for the routes to South America. La Torre del Oro interweaves pieces by Spanish composers of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries (Alonso Mudarra, Lucas Ruiz de Ribayas and Santiago de Murcia) with folk music of Central and South America and the work of composers from Venezuela, Argentina and Chile, all active since 1950: Reynaldo Armas, Simón Díaz, Ignacio ‘Indio’ Figueredo, Agustín Rivas, Hilda Herrera and Violeta Para – a pioneer in the 1960s of the socially conscious nueva canción chilena.