Collection: Sequeiros, Luís Eugénio Santos

Luís Eugénio Santos Sequeiros (1909-2012)

Luís Eugénio Santos Sequeiros was born in Póvoa do Caraminhal (Galiza) on 15 March 1909 into a family of musicians, where the instrument was the piano and the favourite composer was Chopin. The guitar came into Luís Eugénio's life when he studied Medicine in Compostela, where he took part in three tunas as a student. In 1945, he married Pilar Castroviejo Blanco-Ciceron (1914 - 2006), sister of the writers Concha Castroviejo and José Maria Castroviejo. Nine daughters and sons were born of the marriage, who learned music and today preserve his vital, historical, and musical legacy.

After practising medicine in various places, in 1970, he left for Cangas, where he worked and lived until the end of his life. In 1980, he retired and resumed his musical activity, dedicating himself intensely to the guitar: studying the classical repertoire, especially the music of Tárrega, which he loved, making his own arrangements and compositions, creating a plectrum quartet and following the activities of the Galizan Guitar Association of Vigo. He died in Cangas on 24 February 2012, weeks before his 103rd birthday.

The music collection that is preserved includes a good number of piano scores from the 19th and 20th centuries, made up of several generations of pianists and other family musicians, in which there are approximately 150 works for guitar and plectrum orchestra, as part of a collection of some 500 works for various instruments that are still awaiting formal cataloguing. Today, part of the collection is kept at the Cangas Conservatory and Municipal Music School. Santos Sequeiros is one of the most representative Galizan guitarists and guitar composers of the 20th century.