Latin American Electroacoustic Music Collection

alcides lanza, expanção (2002-III), 2002
[(part 1 of ) ... de la historia universal]
(Argentina)



Recording time: 8 min 44 s.
Instruments: For actress-singer, electroacoustic sounds and DSP
Recorded at: Composer' studio (SHELAN Studio) and McGill University EMS. Montreal, QC, Canada.
Remarks: Meg Sheppard, actress-singer; alcides lanza, DSP. Second trilogy: expanção; ontem; vôo.

Other resources available:
- Biography of alcides lanza
- Compositions by alcides lanza

About this composition:

[the 'second' trilogy: expanção-ontem-vôo]. Premiere of Second Trilogy, at the Music Gallery, TorontoMarch 6, 2003]:

expançao [2002-III], for voice, electroacoustic sounds and digital signal processing

expançao [2002-III] is a 'story telling' music setting. it is a companion piece with two other compositions by alcides lanza, vôo and ontem. all three share the ancestral story-telling quality [the 'cuenta-cuentos' of Latin American legends], and all use text based on excerpts from the book NO OUVIDO DO TEMPO/NO OLVIDO DO TEMPO by Brazilian poet and composer Gil Nuno Vaz.

with faint echoes of these other pieces, expançao tells the story of colliding, reflecting universes, and the time reversal that happens [or not] , with life going from old age to infancy.the dramatic center of the piece [around 5 minutes from the start] represents the inexorable fusion of this expansion/contraction phenomena, with 'zero spin' at its limit.

the original text in Portuguese has been modified, deconstructed, and reconstructed, often creating meaningless new meanings, as well as bringing touches of multilingualism to the sung/spoken text. expançao, for voice, tape and digital signal processing, is an adaptation of the earlier piece aXions [2002-II], for voice, chamber ensemble and tape. expançao was written at the request of Meg Sheppard to whom the piece is dedicated.

Tape part assembled at the SHELAN Studio.
Premiered by Meg Sheppard at Pollack Hall, September 16, 2002.

ontem [1999] was written by alcides lanza during the summer of 1999 and realized at the SHELAN studio. The title - meaning 'yesterday' in Portuguese - also refers to things past.
The text is taken from a book by the Brazilian poet-composer Gil Nuno Vaz [see below, notes on 'vôo']. As a pre-quel to 'vôo' the text in 'ontem' is subjected to a number of changes and may sound to the listener ears as Spanish, Italian, French or even other real or imaginary languages. 'ontem' was commissioned by Meg Sheppard and Shawn Mativetsky with a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts.

The poem:
No principio era o ovo, denso.
Depois, a grande explosão, o ovo partido ao meio.
Dos universos gêmeos projetados para fora.
Espaço e tempo simétricos, refletem-se mutuamente.
Caminham, inconscientes um do outro, para o espelho.
O espelho, este lugar-momento em que me encontro.
Dois jovens, dois universos, se aproximam.
Para o choque do encontro.
Raul nada sabe do futuro, apenas o pressente.
Sua memória quase nunca é completa.
Vagas lembranças das coisas que lhe aconteceram.
Leônidas nada sabe do passado, apenas o imagina.
Sua memória nem sempre é perfeita.
Vagas lembranças das coisas que lhe acontecerão.

[English translation]
At the beginning it was the egg, dense.
After, the big explosion, the egg divided at the center.
Two twin universes projected outwards.
Symmetrical space and time, reflecting into themselves.
They march, unconscious of each other, towards the mirror.
The mirror, this place-moment where I find myself.
Two youth, two universes, approaching.
For the clash of the encounter.
Raul knows nothing of the future, just of the present.
His memory is almost never complete.
Faint remembrances of things that have happened to him.
Leonidas knows nothing of the past, he can barely imagine it.
His memory is not always perfect.
Vague remembrances of things that will happen to him.

vôo [1992-I] was commissioned by the Center for the Promotion of Contemporary Music, from the Queen Sofia Art Center (Madrid) to mark the celebration of the 500th anniversary of the first voyage to America by Christopher Columbus. While Spain celebrated this important historical event, many in the Americas deplored and condemned it as resulting in the devastation of the indigenous cultures. This piece seeks to address both sides of this controversy. While celebrating and acknowledging the gift of the "asas da imaginação" which have carried so many explorers to the "great beyond", it also provides a caution to reflect where such explorations may finally take us . Columbus may not have discovered a new world, but this coming together of diverse cultures has certainly produced one.

The text for vôo was based on poems which appear in No Ouvido Do Tempo/ No Olvido Do Tempo, by the Brazilian poet and composer Gil Nuno Vaz. The original text is in Portuguese, but lanza creates his own by viewing the text in a kaleidoscopic way, making the final version multilingual - with Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, and semantic inventions of his own. vôo (flight); asas da imaginação (wings of the imagination); columbinas (doves); abrem se (they open); mundo novo (new world); vão (to go); dentro da historia (inside of history); ser anjo (to be an angel); ser reptil (to be a reptile); suspender pelas alturas (suspended from the heights); volar (fly); os pes (the feet); pisam (to step); então (then...); sutis (subtle); volvemos (we return); ciladas (traps); pequenos acasos (small events); inconstantes (instabilities); lanceros (soldiers); cruces (crosses); plata (silver or money); oro (gold); que van (they go); desviando (detour); la linha leviana (the gentler road); estradas (roads).

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