Free downloadable PDF for CHOIR SSA and ORGAN Licinio Refice (1855-1954) in the Basque Country The priest Licinio Refice, a well-known and renowned composer, visited Euskadi, in particular Bergara and other localities in 1950. He was a friend of Romualdo Galdós, a Jesuit from Eibar and professor at the Gregorian University in Rome. This friendship is the one that explains the visit (perhaps there were more, I do not know). In Bergara he attended a service in the Church of the Society of Mary and was very surprised by the community choir. He asked to see the choir director (Mother Piedad Gaztañaga), congratulated her, gave her a baton and told her that it was the best choir of nuns he had ever heard, and that he would send them a Stabat Mater written by him. The titular image of the church was Our Lady of Solitude. Logical the Stabat Mater. This information was transmitted to me by the nuns themselves many years ago. At the time they received this score which bears two dates, Marquina and Pátrica. I understand that he began to write it in Markina (at the Vera Cruz school?) and finished it in Italy. There is no doubt that the score is Refice's autograph. It remains to be seen if the composer's archive also has another copy, or even if it was published. In Euskadi, an edition was made in 1999, by the publishing house Duo Seraphin, on the occasion of the celebration of the 200th anniversary of the Company of Mary of Bergara, which is the one presented here. Iñigo Alberdi