9 pieces for cello
Premiered in Maison de la Poésie of Paris on 15th January 2012, with an accompaniment of a reading by Juan Gelman.
Cello: Eric Picard.
no stan muridus lus páxarus[1]
¿qué es este ruido en la cabeza?/¿vos?/[2]
Since the seventies I have been hearing Juan Gelmnan’s poetry. In the beginning I did so clandestinely -Juan was banned during Argentina’s dictatorship.
Secretly, I slowly weaved a kind of music that has several points in common with this poetry: exigency, the daily nature of artistic practice, the thoughtful wait for the arrival, from the deep, of a true singing that is immediately unnecessary but indispensable to keep living.
I was incredibly lucky that my secret writing of sound cohabitated with Juan reading his poetry in a presentation on January 2012 in Paris. For that opportunity I wrote nine short fragments (like short poems I would say) for solo cello, which were alternated with his reading. That music was called “Gelmanianas” which is a sort of musical homage and rereading of Gelman’s poetry in which there are subtle alterations of the words and his pose when reading. Everytime I read Juan’s poetry I heard his voice, to myself, as if he were reading his poems to me. This prose is the one that has dictated most of this composition which could resemble, in a way, to a translation.
Luis Naón
[1]Juan Gelman –De DIBAXU – (XXIX) Poesia Reunida – Seix Barral – Pag 840
[2]Juan Gelman – De Citas (CITA XI) Poesia Reunida – Seix Barral -Pag 498
