DOÑA SEBASTIANA (Benavides) Full Score (PDF) for Violin Soloist and String Orchestra (2023)

Violin Soloist
Violin I
Violin II
Viola
Violoncello
Contrabass

All parts available including a rehearsal score (Violin+Piano) which can be used in performance (assuming page turning with a tablet.)

Read about the creation of DOÑA SEBASTIANA on New Century Chamber Orchestra’s blog

“Based on a New Mexican morality tale about a poor woodcutter whose greed gets the best of him when he defies “Lady Death,” Nicolás Lell Benavides’s Doña Sebastiana made an entrancing impression in its commissioned premiere. As it moved from layered sliding harmonies to brooding and pungent passages and sweet bird sounds, the story the composer had described in charming opening remarks took shape in a listener’s imagination.

Lightly percussive touches (the cellists slapping the bodies of their instruments) and a wittily abrupt ending made for an evocative, effectively concise work of musical storytelling. It all happened in eight minutes. The orchestra… gave a warm and responsive reading under Music Director Daniel Hope on lead violin.”

• Steven Winn, SFCV

Program Notes for DOÑA SEBASTIANA 

New Mexico frequently stands at the intersection of many cultures; its isolation having helped preserve some of the folk traditions that might have washed away through assimilation. Rudolfo Anaya, New Mexico’s greatest author, and José Griego y Maestas adapted some of the most popular folk tales in side-by-side English and Spanish with illustrations called Cuentos: Tales from the Hispanic Southwest. Many of them are dark, but the most intriguing of all is the tale of the skeletal Doña Sebastiana, more commonly known as Santa Muerte.

In the story, a poor and very hungry woodcutter is cooking a chicken when he is approached by Jesus, who asks to share a meal. The woodcutter refuses, saying that Jesus neglects the poor. Next the Virgin Mary approaches, asking to share his meal. He refuses once again, boldly telling her that she should intercede and tell her son not to neglect the poor. Finally, a shadowy woman appears and requests to sit with him. He asks who she is, and she reveals herself to be Doña Sebastiana, death herself. He decides he will share because she treats all of us equally. As a reward, she makes him a curandero, a healer, but warns him never to intercede when she is present, because that soul is destined to be hers. The woodcutter becomes a successful curandero and forgets his humble beginnings. One day a very rich man is dying and promises the woodcutter unimaginable riches if only he could be healed. Upon walking in, the woodcutter sees Doña Sebastiana standing there. In his greed, he covers her head and wrestles her away so he can heal the man. Later, she takes the woodcutter to a dark room where there are two candles: one burning brightly for the woodcutter, and one flickering weakly for the rich man whose life he saved. She tells him nobody can cheat death, and she swaps the candles just as the flickering one, now belonging to the woodcutter, extinguishes.

I’ve always loved this story because it manages to teach a lesson (don’t be greedy!), paint Santa Muerte as a fair figure, and pose some big questions about the role of religion and poverty in colonialism. There aren’t many stories in which a mere mortal challenges the son of God, though of course he meets his end prematurely. Santa Muerte, as she is known throughout central America, is highly regarded in modern times in counterculture precisely because of her equal treatment of all, with the LGBTQ+ community embracing her especially in Mexico.

While she is only called Doña Sebastiana in New Mexico, Santa Muerte is frequently shown as a cloaked woman who rides a cart and carries a bow and arrow in lieu of the scythe. It seemed a perfect fit to write the violin soloist as Doña Sebastiana and tell the story of the woodcutter in a short programmatic piece. You will hear a pared down version of this story, with Doña Sebastiana being performed by the violin, and the woodcutter’s transformation via his encounter with Santa Muerte shown through the orchestra. You will hear his optimism, her offer, and the world it opens up for him before he squanders it. Santa Muerte, it seems in her fairness, plays by the rules. We are the ones who are always trying to bend and break them.

I want to thank New Century Chamber Orchestra and Daniel Hope for commissioning this work for the California Festival. My formative years as a composer were in San Francisco, and it means so much to return to my artistic home to work with an ensemble I’ve long looked up to for its daring artistry.

Photos of premiere with Daniel Hope and the New Century Chamber Orchestra by Stefan Cohen. (2023)