Zarzuela Marine Themes

Maritime subjects in zarzuela, the Spanish form of sung-and-spoken lyric theater that flourished from the mid-19th century. Coastal and seafaring settings appear in works such as Pablo Sorozabal’s ‘La tabernera del puerto’ (The Innkeeper of the Port, 1936), set in a fishing village and built around smuggling and the sea, and in numbers evoking sailors, ports, and fishermen. These pieces carried maritime working life and port communities onto the Spanish stage.