The sounds and music of poetry in Unión Radio (1925-1935)

Abstract

This article addresses the presence of poetry on Spanish radio during the Silver Age, focusing on the station Unión Radio and its magazine Ondas. Data on poetry at the time are recovered through archival work, including the possible first appearance of Rafael Alberti on radio. The study shows that poetry was of interest to the nascent cultural industry, which considered it compatible with radio due to their common oral and sound nature. To analyze the relationships between poetry, sound, and music, various phenomena are addressed, such as the musicalization of poetic texts and recitation with background music, distinguishing between classical and popular music. Texts from the past, like romances, were often set to music, and names of 19th-century poets stood out, especially those from Romanticism, such as Bécquer, and fin-de-siècle modernism, including Rubén Darío and the Machado brothers. In the 1930s, the poets of the Generation of 1927 began to emerge, with the outstanding case of Lorca’s popular songs, the rise of flamenco, and the couplet.