"As the Argentine singer Sofía Rei led her
multinational band, the passion and clarity with which she assayed a tricky mix
of South American rhythms and jazz-inflected harmonies made clear why she has
been embraced by New York City audiences from Carnegie Hall to the hippest
downtown haunts." - The New York Times
Paying tribute to an exceptional artist demands an exceptional
work of art.
Chilean singer, songwriter, folklorist, social activist,
poet, and visual artist Violeta Parra would have celebrated her 100th birthday
this year. In her new recording, El Gavilán, vocalist, songwriter and producer
Sofia Rei celebrates her legacy by approaching her music with the imagination
and daring that characterize Parra's work.
Recorded as a duo with guitarist Marc Ribot and featuring
guitarist Angel Parra, Violeta's grandson, on one song, Sofía re-imagines
Parra's music in a contemporary setting.
It is, in essence, the classic folk voice-and-guitar format, but framed
here by both, electronics and traditional instruments. Besides providing all
vocals and the sound sculpting, Sofia also plays caja vidalera, a hand-held
single head drum from Argentina's northwest, and charango, a small, five double
string guitar from the Andean region of South America. The results - spacious
and almost minimalist, the vocals layered with loops and pedal effects -
illuminate Parra´s work from unexpected angles.
"When I decided to do a tribute to Violeta, my first
questions were 'Which Violeta are we celebrating and for what? What do we want
to achieve by it?,' "reflects Sofia. "Her lyrics have a new force
today. But there is much more to Violeta than great songs such as 'Gracias a La
Vida," or 'Volver a los 17.' Violeta was an innovator. Beyond the music
and the words, it's her concept, her ideas. She not only worked at preserving
traditional Chilean songs, styles and rhythms [as a folklorist], but then made
a great synthesis of it all and that became the New Song movement. She invented
a new tradition. To have a tribute that would recreate what she already did so
well 50 years ago didn't make sense. It seemed to me a better idea to celebrate
her spirit, take chances and create something new."
The set includes classics such as "Casamiento de
Negros," "La Lavandera," "Maldigo del Alto Cielo" and
"Run Run se fue pa'l Norte," but its heart is Parra's little-known
masterpiece, "El Gavilán," an ambitious work originally intended for
ballet, vocalist, choir and indigenous instruments. It´s an astounding piece,
written in the late 50s, before her best-known songs, and in it, Parra mixes
elements of Chilean folk tradition and 20th Century classical music. It´s a
remarkable piece for a self-taught musician, and especially so for one who, up
to then, had worked in the folk idiom.
"There is little known about this piece except for a
famous radio interview in 1960 in which she talks about 'El Gavilán' and sings
and plays its first movement, " says Sofia. "And in this interview
she also talks about the idea of the gavilán (the sparrow hawk) representing
the idea of the masculine, of the oppressor and connects it with capitalism.
The other main character is a hen, representing the feminine, the oppressed,
the betrayed. And what she does musically, singing and playing is
remarkable."
Born in Argentina, Sofia started her career as a member of
the Children's Choir at the Teatro Colón, the La Scala of Buenos Aires, at age
9. She was classically trained at the National Conservatory and later became
part of the avant-garde vocal scene. In 2001, she moved to Boston to study jazz
and improvised music at the New England Conservatory where she received her
Master's Degree. She moved to New York in 2005 and since she has released three
critically acclaimed albums under her own name. Two of those recordings earned
an Independent Music Award for Best Album.
She met Ribot, an eclectic and adventurous guitarist who
proved a key contributor in El Gavilán, as members of The Song Project,
premiered during John Zorn´s 60th Birthday celebration. Ribot became intrigued
by Sofia's re-imagining of Parra's music, especially in the ambitious "El
Gavilán," and their chance collaboration grew into a duo.
"He asked me for translations of all the lyrics and
dove right in," says Sofia. "Marc is a politically engaged musician
and I believe Violeta's work spoke to him not only musically but because of its
social and political message."
"I´ve always thought I owed myself a Violeta Parra
record, but done like this, differently," says Sofia, who was a child when she first heard
Violeta's songs but only interpreted by Mercedes Sosa. "It took many years
until I actually heard Violeta herself in a recording. I find that there's a sort of revisionist
view of her, a pink version, almost naïve - and that is not Violeta. Violeta
was a very strong, intense woman."
Her personal life in shambles, Parra, as an artist,
folklorist and social activist, found herself "alone in a quixotic
struggle," as Sofia puts it. Violeta Parra died by her own hand in her
performing tent in La Reina, an area outside Santiago, on February 1967, months
short of her 50th birthday.
The closing track, "Run Run se fue pa'l Norte,"
was written by Parra for her companion of five years, the Swiss musician
Gilbert Favre, nicknamed Run Run, who left her to start a new life in Bolivia.
Sofia's subtle arrangement sets it to a landó, a Peruvian rhythm. The cloud of
sound, at times luminous and ominous, is by guitarist Angel Parra, Violeta's
grandson and a member of the Chilean rock group Los Tres, who has "his own
contemporary approach to Violeta's music" says Sofia.
"'Run Run' is a long song and the opening verse closes
with the line "... y cuenta una
aventura que paso a deletrear ..." (And speaks of an adventure that I now
begin to spell out ... ) " and that's where we left it," explains
Sofia. "It's like a point where Violeta ends and her legend begins. It was
the perfect line in which to end the album."
SOFIA REI - EL GAVILÁN SHOWS
April 29: Subrosa NYC ft. Marc Ribot - New York, NY
April 30: Atlanta Jazz Festival - Atlanta, GA
May 26: Arts Garage - Delray Beach, FL
May 27-29: Spoleto Festival - Charleston, SC
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