para flauta en sol y arpa
Dedicada a José Manuel López
Esta obra fue escrita a petición de Beatriz Millán y Manuela Vos.
Partitura en Babelscores
La luna, imagen recurrente en
todos los autores de haiku, símbolo
frecuente del retorno y la continuidad a la vez que de lo efímero y
transitorio, imagen unida a tantos haikus que están escritos mirando “cara a
cara” a la muerte: de los cientos de ellos que he ido recopilando en torno a lo
lunar, incluyo más abajo los textos que han servido como base para la
construcción de toda la “imaginería” de la obra. Haikus de la luna está dedicada al
compositor José Manuel López, también un apasionado del arte japonés.
Haikus de la luna
(Moon Haikus)
When Beatriz Millán and
Manuela Vos asked me for a new composition I was working in very shorts pieces
for piano, inspired on that wonderful form of Japanese poetry called Haiku. Of course, the idea of writing
for Harp and Flute (G Flute) was a way on going further in the haiku world in a
larger piece. So I took inspiration in several haikus about moon and in the
similitude between this combination, alto flute and harp, with the two beauty
Japanese instruments Sakuhachi and Koto.
Haikus de la luna could be divided in several sections in
correspondence to the four haikus that inspire them. But these sections are
mixed and interrelated between then, like mixed impressions in a photo. The poetic
form of Haiku it’s known like a very short piece, non rhetoric. But, it is
really so short? I felt the necessity of enlarge duration because the intense
impression of a Haiku lasts a lot, is like a prolonged eco in head and heart.
So in music, I was interested in this sensation of no time, or at least in the
construction of other –musical- time, of one impression prolonged.
The Moon is a recurrent
image in Chinese and Japanese poetry. It is a Symbol of Repetition and
Continuity but also of Change and Ephemeral, so of Death, so of Life. Its (her)
enchantment and mystery impregnates the entire piece with her tenuous light.
This poetical universe has
to be combined in practice with the mastering of virtuoso treatment of the two
instruments. The main difficulty perhaps is that never brilliant performance or
technical resources must emerge out of the poetic atmosphere and careful sound
that the performer must achieve. Both instruments have important solo parts,
but both need also much concentration for create together a magic world, based
on an aural and visual sense, and in rhythmical fluency.
The writing of the harp part
requires mastering of pedalling, sensibility for colour and different levels of
discourse at the same time. Timbrical effects are used in context, so the
performer must not use them like a “catalogue” of harp resources, but like
poetical images.
I would say a word about my
way of writing: I tend lately to use a very careful notation, very precise rhythmically.
I want to avoid the feeling of “no pulse” that flows in a lot of aleatory
music. But in no way this writing
pretend be complete: it needs interpretation, like the traditional scores. No
writing of music is completed or is exact indication of a universe only the
performer can understand and (re)created. Complex writing minds for me to look
at detail but not forget in any case the general gesture and phrasing.
I reproduce here the texts
of the haikus I used like poetical images. They helped me to elaborate the
character, musical figures and motifs of the piece. I could find only the
translation to English of Bashô's Haiku. I write the others in Spanish because
to make a translation of a free translation is, I think, too risky, and too far
away of the original sense.
"Contempla mi cara":
la luna se quita su tocado (de nubes)
¡la luminosidad!
Anónimo
Luna en la tarde.
las flores del ciruelo
caen sobre su koto
Shiki
Pulpos en los botes;
vagos sueños
bajo la luna estival
Bashô
Desecho el pincel.
De aquí en adelante le hablaré a la luna
cara a cara.
Koha
Créditos:
Anónimo: traducción de
Vicente Haya, p.75 en “El corazón del haiku”, colección Alquitara, ed. Mandala
Ediciones, Madrid 2002.
Shiki: traducción
de Antonio Cabezas, p.134, en “Jaikus inmortales”, Hiperión, Madrid 1999.
Basho: traducción de
Fernando Rodríguez-Izquierdo, p.442, en
“El haiku japonés”, Hiperión, Madrid 2001.
Koha: traducción
de Eduardo Moga, en “Poemas japoneses a la muerte”, p. 191, en DVD ediciones,
Barcelona 2002.
