The Imaginary Bird: A dialogic performance in a contemporary music for solo flute

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1 International Symposium on Performance Science ISBN The Author 2013, Published by the AEC All rights reserved The Imaginary Bird: A dialogic performance in a contemporary music for solo flute Silvia Maria Pires Cabrera Berg 1 and Sara Lima da Silveira Costa 2 1 Department of Music, School of Philosophy, Sciences, and Literature of Ribeirão Preto, University of São Paulo, Brazil 2 Department of Music, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil The Imaginary Bird for solo flute uses all technical features of the instrument, including the creation of new resources through the use of extended techniques. The flute is itself central to the composition as it becomes the imaginary bird. It takes the warble of the Uirapurú bird as the sound source and recreates it as transcription fragments in a plaiting of natural sounds and overtones, using an extensive range of technical approaches. Interpretively, the aims are to solve the composition s complexity, releasing its intellectual energy into a performance with meaningful physicality. Keywords: performance; contemporary music; solo flute; instrumental technique; The Imaginary Bird Uirapurú is the legendary bird from the Amazon forest that has been connected with several folk legends. The Uirapurú is the bird that is not a bird" in the indigenous Tupi language because, for the Tupis, the Uirapurú is a god who takes the form of a bird, always in the companionship of other birds, with the mission of leading lost people (who own a talisman) to their homes. The Uirapurú has a pure warble similar to a flute playing high tones; it is so rare that only recently have a few samples been recorded, contributing to the ever-increasing legends of its existence (Frisch 2005). The Brazilian composer H. Villa-Lobos composed the Symphonic Poem Uirapurú in 1917, inspired by the sources he collected over a long trip to the Brazilian north region. The Uirapurú warble is only sung during nesting, about 10 minutes in the early morning and again by evening, only 15 days a year. In The Imaginary

2 390 Bird, composed by the first author, the flute takes the warble of the Uirapurú and recreates it as a transcription fragment, quoted in bars 51 to 55, 64 to 66, 86 to 89, and 119 to 122. The work incorporates other birds fragmentary songs in a plaiting of natural sounds, overtones, reconstructed fragments, and sound material developed from those sources, using a variety of technical approaches. The rhythmic landscape provides structured changes where melodic layers flow almost as organic improvisations. The research, composition, and performance of contemporary music are immersed in complexity due to the massive range of data to which one has access. This is perhaps the biggest challenge to overcome, since, for effective filtration of information, it is necessary to have a deep understanding of musical language and its forms of expression and interpretation. It is valuable to review Pythagoras concept of Mousiké applied to contemporary music, where music is understood as a dialogue between languages, frameworks, and compositional processes in the context of the creation and performance of contemporary works, explaining music theory critically and holistically, and designing musical thought both as complex and multiform (Tomás 2002). Ricciardi (2013) lists three fundamentals of musical activities, in what he called a fusion of horizons, returning to these fundamental Greek concepts: music theory, composition and performance, and interpretation. Related is the Danish composer Per Nørgård s use of the concept of Interferens (interference) in his music, in which when two events affect each other and cause a third occurrence that emerges in the consciousness of the listener (Nørgård 2009) creating what he calls Mellemværender or Mellemhandlende (here translated as intermediate space). Thus, the most important features are not manifested physically but rather in the consciousness of the listener or musician. MAIN CONTRIBUTION The Imaginary Bird s formal and rhythmic structures are built on mirrored processes. These compositional techniques, widely used in contrapuntal compositions, have had a revival in modern and contemporary music. The golden section and the Fibonacci sequence are widely used compositional features, though each composer puts them to particular use. The Uirapurú warble (see Figure 1) is quoted four times in the work, sometimes literally, sometimes in condensed form. The warble is composed mostly of major seconds, fourths, and fifths. The composition and structure of

3 INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON PERFORMANCE SCIENCE 391 Figure 1. The Uirapurú warble. Figure 2. Formal structure of The Imaginary Bird, showing metric resonance. the bird s warble is the source from which all melodic structures are derived through filtering processes. The work uses a form of mirrored metric structure classified by the composer as metric resonance (see Figure 2). It is based upon metric proportions similar to those of a harmonic series in which new metric proportions are derived from ground proportions. The first mirrored structure takes place from bars 1-51 with bar 34 as the axis. Bar 51 then features a quotation of the Uirapurú warble. The second appearance occurs at bar 64, the center of two mirrors (in lines a and b of Figure 2). Bar 109 is similarly structured. The Imaginary Bird is formally structured around the golden section (see Figures 3 and 4). The first appearance takes place from bars with the axis at bar 51. The second incorporates the 33-bar Coda added to the end of the first 134-bar section. Bars 34 and 55 play structurally important roles as they occupy the ninth and tenth places in the Fibonacci series bar 34 is the first mirror axis and bar 55 features the end of a full appearance of the Uirapurú warble. Processes of melodic transformation can be observed from the first bar, where the intercalated intervals contained in the Uirapurú warble are quoted (see Figure 5). Through processes of filtering, the melodic material is transmuted to the warbles of other birds (all imaginary; e.g. see Figure 6) in structures that utilize resonance effects, suggesting polyphonic constructions as those employed by J. S. Bach.

4 392 Figure 3. Golden section relationships between section lengths in The Imaginary Bird. Figure 4. Mirrored structures and key bars in The Imaginary Bird.

5 INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON PERFORMANCE SCIENCE 393 Figure 5. Bar 1 of The Imaginary Bird. Figure 6. Bar 61 of The Imaginary Bird. IMPLICATIONS In the performance and interpretation of any work, one must consider (1) what is immanent to the work and has (or has not) to be executed (performance considerations and implications), and (2) what is not immanent to the work and should (or should not) be executed (interpretative considerations and implications) In the process of studying a work, the following strategies may be used in order to understand the processes of its composition, and thus how it is to be interpreted and performed: (1) analytical strategies, in order to understand the structure of the work, its materials, and its compositional processes; (2) technical strategies, in order to process the reading of the score and the notation of melodic and rhythmic structures connected with the use of all technical possibilities of the instrument and its expanded technique; (3) performatic strategies, in order to create a systematic reading, as well as an identification and memorization of complex structures; and (4) interpretive strategies, in order to process the work as a whole and to solve the composition s complexity, releasing its intellectual energy into a performance with meaningful physicality and transcending the processes of analysis, technical resolutions, and performance.

6 394 Address for correspondence Silvia Maria Pires Cabrera Berg, Department of Music, School of Philosophy, Sciences, and Literature of Ribeirão Preto, University of São Paulo, Av. Bandeirantes, 3.900, Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo , Brazil; Sara Lima da Silveira Costa, Department of Music, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Av. Antonio Carlos, 6627 Pampulha, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais , Brazil; References Frisch J. D. (2005). Aves Brasileiras (third edition). São Paulo, Brazil: Dalgas Ecoltec. Nørgård P. (2009). Et tilbageblik undervejs. In I. Hansen (ed.), Per Nørgård: Tilbageblik Undervejs: Artikler (pp. 1-6). Copenhagen: Edition Wilhelm Hansen. Ricciardi R. (2013). A música na madrugada do destino uma poética musical para o século XXI. In R. Russomano and E. Zamphrona (eds.), Quatro Ensaios sobre Música e Filosofia (pp ). Ribeirão Preto, Brazil: Editora Coruja. Tomás L. (2002). Ouvir o lógos: música e filosofia. São Paulo, Brazil: Fundação Editora da UNESP.