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Volume 14
Studies in Latin American and Spanish History
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Music and Nineteenth-Century Liberalism in the Ibero-American Atlantic Space
Edited by Alberto Hernández Mateos, João Silva, and Luísa Cymbron
306 pages, 24 illus., 6 tables, bibliog., index
ISBN 978-1-80758-038-4 $135.00/£104.00 / Hb / Not Yet Published (October 2026)
eISBN 978-1-80758-039-1 eBook Not Yet Published
Description
Liberalism—in its political, economic, and ethical forms—shaped the 19th-century Western world. Rooted in philosophy and expressed through economic and political systems, liberalism was complex and often contradictory. This book explores the influence of liberalism on music in Portugal, Spain, and Latin America—regions where liberalism evolved amid conflict that left deep cultural marks. Rather than focusing on nation-states, the authors trace the circulation of music across borders and highlight cultural exchanges during pivotal moments such as the “Atlantic crises” (after 1807-08) and the revolutionary cycle of 1820–1823. Through operas, zarzuelas, the press, wind and brass bands, as well as debates on slavery, they reveal how liberalism was performed and imagined, offering a fresh perspective on music and ideology.
Luísa Cymbron is a professor of Music History at NOVA University Lisbon (NOVA FCSH). She has directed CESEM (the Centre for Music Studies) since 2023. Her research on 19th-century Portuguese music was groundbreaking. Her 2012 book Olhares sobre a música em Portugal no século XIX is the first to provide in-depth analyses of various aspects of 19th-century music in Portugal, while Francisco de Sá Noronha’s Biography (2019) explores the musical relations between Portugal and Brazil. Since 2020, she has edited two further books, and her current research focuses particularly on the history of music in the Atlantic region.
Alberto Hernández Mateos is a professor of Music History at the University of Salamanca. His research is centered on the study of musical culture in the 18th and 19th centuries.
João Silva is a researcher, educator and editor affiliated with INET-MD (NOVA FCSH). His work focuses on music history, early phonography and sound studies in the Portuguese Empire in the 19th and 20th centuries. He is editor of the Journal of World Popular Music.
Subject: History: 18th/19th CenturyCultural Studies (General)
Area: Latin America and the CaribbeanSouthern Europe
Contents
Of Related Interest
Spanish Laughter
Humor and Its Sense in Modern Spain
The Configuration of the Spanish Public Sphere
From the Enlightenment to the Indignados
Metaphors of Spain
Representations of Spanish National Identity in the Twentieth Century
