Santiago de Murcia (July 25, 1673 – April 25, 1739) was a Spanish guitarist and composer.
Until the publication of new research in 2008, few details were known about Santiago de Murcia’s life. Today, however, it is known that he was born in Madrid and that his parents were Juan de Murcia and Magdalena Hernandez. In May 1695, he married Josefa Garcia.
In his printed collection of guitar music, “Resumen de acompañar,” Murcia describes himself as the guitar master of Queen Maria Luisa of Savoy, Spain. She was the first wife of Philip V, the first Bourbon king of Spain, a grandson of Louis XIV of France, who ascended the Spanish throne after the death of Charles II in November 1700. The marriage took place on September 11, 1701, in Turin, officiated by proxy. On November 3, the wedding was celebrated again in Figueres (Girona). In April 1702, Philip V embarked on a tour of his Italian possessions and appointed Maria Luisa regent in his absence. There is no reason to believe that Murcia traveled with him to Naples or met the composers Arcangelo Corelli and Alessandro Scarlatti. Maria Luisa arrived in Madrid on June 30, and it is unlikely that Murcia was appointed her master of the guitar before this date. It is assumed that he held this position until her death in 1714. Antonio de Murcia was appointed instrument maker to the queen in 1704.
In 1714, Murcia dedicated a treatise on the guitar to Jácome Francisco Andriani, a special envoy of the Catholic cantons of Switzerland to the King of Spain (Andriani, born in northern Italy, moved to Spain, where he was admitted to the Order of Santiago in 1712). Andriani enabled Murcia to publish his guitar treatise by sponsoring the engraving of the work.
Although two of the surviving manuscript collections of Murcia’s music—”Passacalles y obras” and “Codice Saldivar no. 4″—surfaced in Mexico in modern times, they were most likely brought there later by subsequent owners. It now seems improbable that Santiago de Murcia himself ever traveled to Mexico. “Passacalles y obras” is dedicated to a certain Joseph Alvarez de Saavedra, but it is not known whether this is the same “Joseph Alvarez” who died in Puebla in 1737.
Andriani evidently maintained trade relations with Latin America, particularly with Chile and Mexico. The most probable scenario is that Murcia produced manuscript copies of his music for patrons, which were then exported to the New World.
Later in his life, in 1729, he signed a declaration of poverty. He died in Madrid in 1739.
One of the most important aspects of Murcia’s music is its interest in a wide range of existing music for guitar. Thus, the collections contain works of various styles side by side, offering a rich and diverse panorama of the Baroque repertoire for guitar.
On September 18, 2006, the newspaper El Mercurio reported that the manuscript of Santiago de Murcia’s music, Cifras selectas de guitarra, dating from 1722, had been discovered in Chile. The discovery was made by musicologist Alejandro Vera of the Music Institute of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. The music consists of French and Spanish dances.