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Production:
Radio & Television
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​PERU

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His activity was very intense both in radio and television. Here are some of his own programs but there were many appearances in special programs or as a guest artist. More information is available in the section Production/Perfonmances

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Television
 

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"Por los caminos del Arte" . The seventies. In Nicomedes' words: "The double purpose of the program is to show, on the one hand, the interrelation that exists between all the arts of all the peoples of the world, whatever their degree of development, and on the other, that all the paths of art can and should lead to the integration of the national, continental and world community.  

 

"Danzas y canciones del Perú". Since the mid-1970s.

Vídeo. Panamericana TV. 1978 (Canal Youtube de MR SiCoDeLiCo)

Radio
 

"Romancero de las calles de Lima".

1958.

According to the contract: "Nicomedes' commitment is to recite or narrate writings about the streets of Lima, and he must also write the verses for them. The duration of each writing shall not exceed five minutes, each one of them constituting a radio microprogram. Such programs may be broadcasted up to two per day, being previously recorded on tape. This work will be carried out during three months from June 2 to September 2 inclusive"

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"Así canta mi Perú".

Radio América. De Lunes a Sábado de 12.00 a 12.30p.m. 
Con voz que aflige y que alegra, / con voz de quena y laúd, / con voz indoblanquinegra / ¡Así canta mi Perú...!

 

"América canta así".

Radio América.  De Lunes a Sábado de 12.30 p.m a 13.00pm
En Maya, quechua y aymara, / araucano y guarani; / con arpa, bombo y antara / ¡América canta así!

 

"Música por la Ruta del Sol". From 1978.

Program "Así canta mi Perú". November 1975.

Interview with Horacio Guarany

 
 
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SPAIN 

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He only worked in radio

 

 

Radio Exterior de España. 

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Radio Exterior de España (REE) is a public broadcasting media, dependent on Radio Nacional de España (RNE), which is responsible for transmission via satellites, Internet and HF (popularly known as Onda Corta) for Spaniards outside the country and for foreigners interested in Spain. It began broadcasting on shortwave on March 15, 1942. â€‹

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Activities performed by Nicomedes at Radio Exterior.

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Reports.

On a daily basis, he conducts personal interviews, recorded in situ or telephone interviews at national and international level.

 

Realization.

He processes his own daily interviews. It also selects the chronicles and interviews received daily at Central Control from the Regional Centers. The press releases sent to him by the many organizations and institutions contacted by the program. And finally, he extracts from the sound archive the music and words needed for the editing.  

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Writing.

He writes the scripts for their participation in the daily program, photocopying them for handling, recording and archiving.

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Presentation.

He is the announcer of the programs that are recorded daily.

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Nicomedes suggested including two new broadcasts in Quechua and Guarani. At that time, REE was broadcasting in English, French, Arabic, Russian, German and Sephardic, and Nicomedes demonstrated the importance of these two languages. In 1989 the project was launched. And it was he who was in charge of finding people in Madrid who spoke these languages to translate the texts. These broadcasts were on the air until 1993.

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Programs:

 

"Ruta del Sol" (1982-1985)

Since June 1982. It was broadcasted at half past one in the morning to reach America at eight o'clock at night and included both what was happening in Spain and in America (related to each other).

 

"Cita en España" (1985-1989)

Presented with a Carlos Seco.

From 1985, with the new director of Radio Exterior, the news is limited to give everything that happens in Spain, related to Latin America. Last program: January 13, 1989

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"Encuentro en el ´92: Quinto Centenario". (1989-1991)

Broadcast on Sundays. First program; January 15, 1989.

Several presenters.

Nicomedes' job is to comment on books and publications.
He recounts the most important events related to 1992. Program with four main points: Fifth centenary; Seville Expo; Madrid European City of Culture; Barcelona Olympics. The first point, the Fifth Centenary was the most important, all the acts related to the event were covered, that made that all the great authors and also the new values of literature and everything that had to do with the world related to the Ibero-American art went through the program.

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"Crónicas de ida y vuelta" (1991)

It is broadcast on Saturdays as part of Radio Exterior's 'World Service'. . 

Since July 1, 1991

 

Testimonies about his time in Radio Exterior

Interview.

“París se llena de cisco... ¡y carbonería!”, por Julia Wun.

Diario la República. April 13, 1987.

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- ¿How was 'Cita en España' born?

 

-It started in 1982, under the name 'Ruta del Sol'. I already had a similar program on a Peruvian radio station in Lima. It was broadcast at half past one in the morning so that it could reach America at eight at night and it included both what was happening in Spain and what was happening in America (related to each other). From 1985, with the new director of Radio Exterior, we limited ourselves to give everything that happens in Spain, related to Latin America, that is why it is now called 'Cita en España' (Rendezvous in Spain).'

 

-¿How do you run the program?

 

-It's about Ibero-American themes and characters on Spanish soil. I do interviews, and there is a backdrop or a feature that is music from the American continent.

 

-...And I had an idea that your program was of a folkloric nature...

 

-It has never been folkloric. What happens is that our America is folkloric? America has two instances: either you look at everything from an academic, totally university prism or you look at everything through the charango and the quena. But the same event can be looked at from both instances in reality. I, perhaps following the example of José Carlos Mariátegui, have never looked at things from an academic, sociological, ethnological or anthropological point of view, but from the popular roots of things. Whether it's about problems as crucial as the foreign debt or problems as simple as some religious festivity, which sometimes provokes claims or special requests... but that means you have an audience, and that's good. The program itself, it is true, has had in its beginnings a rather traditional, traditional character, but little by little it has gone to the political, economic and sociological.

 

-However, you continue to spread American culture, don't you?

 

-Look, radio here in Spain, as you have seen, both FM and shortwave, is necessarily talk radio. Very little music is played, minimum percentage. It's nothing more than bursts and things like that... although there are stations that are totally musical... in general it's not like that. I was in a program that was almost informative, without being so. So, we have nothing more than curtains, bursts to mark the change from one information to another, and to alternate, to leave a cushion of a minute, in case the continuity is short... It is there where I take advantage to put folkloric music, because I have here more than 3000 Lp. records from all the Ibero-American continent.

 

-And does Peruvian music get any special treatment from you?

 

-It is that in Spain they do not distinguish the music of one country or another. Generally they want a range of the whole continent. Now, some countries are more promoted than others. They generally look at things at a Caribbean, Andean, Central American and Southern Cone level, so it forces you to be very continental, although I was before coming to Spain? But what I have done is a series: 'Juglares de nuestra América', which is a kind of projection of the Spanish romancers in America, but also starting from a pre-Columbian romancero; from these Aztec poets who called them piucatique, from the Inca poets, the amautas... I follow all this path until I reach the end of my career. ... I follow all this way up to the present day, and this, country by country, starting with the Caribbean, Central America, down the Amazon to Brazil and the Southern Cone, and the Andean countries... in total 18 chapters

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-You won an award with one of these, didn't you?

 

-Yes, last year I proposed one of these chapters, the one dedicated to Panama, in the fourth edition of the International Broadcasting Award (Spain). I was awarded the Pablo Serrano trophy-sculpture. The chapter was called 'Los mejoraneros panameños'.

 

-And the other chapters of the series?   

 

-Well, three are dedicated to Mexico, two to Peru (one to the values of the Quechua language, another to the mestizo values and another to singers of tristes and cumananas). In short, it is a work that now I have been asked to take it to the records, for the transcription service of Radio Nacional de España. I also plan to publish a book that will be the literary part of this one, because there are sectorial groups of the Panamanian singers, of the Peruvian decimists until 1982 (which I did), but there is no continental work, even starting from the pre-Columbian period of the old Spanish medieval romancero.

 

- And when will this edition be ready?

 

-It depends on when there will be a publisher available.... I am thinking of proposing it to the Institute of Ibero-American Cooperation and if they do not have a publisher, the most feasible thing would be to publish it in our continent, perhaps in Colombia or Mexico, or I would enter it to participate in the contest of the Iberoamerican Americas in Cuba. I also have other things in preparation, and even more advanced, like this work I am doing on the presence of the black contribution in Peru. I am very interested in having it published, although I have not finished it yet, but these are things that could be ready by the end of this year or the beginning of next year.

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-And new albums?

 

-The work I do in Spain does not allow me to record anything. The whole morning is dedicated to interviews, and to receive information from the provinces, and the afternoon for mixing and recording; I return home around nine o'clock at night, usually after attending a conference or giving a recital. For the rest, I think that everything I had to do in records was done in Lima. I made my first record in 59 and my last one in 80, before leaving Peru.

 

xxx

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Thematic series for Radio Exterior de España

(apart from regular programming)

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Juglares de nuestra América.

1985

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Duración de cada programa: 55 minutos (aprox.). Emitido por Radio 3 - Radio Nacional de España. 1985.
Guión, Realización: Nicomedes Santa Cruz; Locución: Nicomedes Santa Cruz / Pedro H. Muñoz.

Capítulo I: Romances de España en América

Menéndez Pidal al encuentro del romancero en América / Del trovador europeo al repentista criollo/ El viejo romancero en la diáspora sefardí / El romancero en la memoria de los conquistadores / Los cronistas rimadores en la conquista de América.

 

Capitulo II: Nuevo Mester Andino (Del Harawi al Yaravi)

Los trovadores precolombinos / El "Cancionero de la evangelización" / El teatro popular: "Moros y Cristianos" / El negro trovador de Hispanoamérica / Nuevo Mester Andino: Del Harawi al Yaraví.

 

Capítulo III: Romances de España y de América.

Romances tradicionales/ Romances históricos / Romances moriscos / Romances amorosos / Romancero fabulista hispanoamericano.

 

Capítulo IV: El Corrido Mexicano

Antigüedad del Corrido / Colección y pesquiza de don Vicente T. Mendoza / Corridos de la Revolución Mexicana / Corridos de la Rebelión Cristera / Elementos estructurales del corrido / Corridos de asuntos varios.

 

Capítulo V: Canto en controversia de repentistas.

Antecedentes europeos de la controversia / El canto "a lo divino" y "a lo humano" / Las reglas de la controversia / Melopeas e instrumentos de la trova / Repentistas famosos del Bravo al Plata.

 

Capítulo VI: El Punto Cubano.

Antecedentes del Punto Cubano / Décima, Punto y Tonada / Punto Libre y Punto Fijo / El Punto Guajiro en la Revolución Cubana / Controversia en Punto Guajiro.

 

Capítulo VII: Los Trovadores Borinqueños.

El canto del Jíbaro Borinqueño / Décimas hexasílabas y octosílabas / Aguinaldos, Seis, Milongas y Llaneras / El canto "a lo divino" y "a lo humano" / Los trovadores independentistas de Puerto Rico.

 

Capítulo VIII: Los Mejoraneros Panameños. 

Fecha de Emisión: 24 de Agosto de 1985. Duración: 57´45.

Capítulo galardonado con el IV Premio Internacional España de Radiodifusión.

La "saloma" y los "arrucaos" / La "mejorana" y la "bacona" / Los torrentes: "mesano", "gallino" y "zapatero" / Cantos a la soberanía panameña.

The Panamanian "mejoraneros" are the American equivalent of the minstrels and troubadours of the Spanish Middle Ages. Their singing in Spanish and their musical accompaniment on the pentacorde guitar called MEJORANA or BOCONA give irrefutable proof of their Hispanic heritage. But neither can its native and black-African1 contributions be denied, as well as the crossbreeding of these ethnicities and cultures in its folkloric consolidation. From the auroral presence of the first discoverers and colonizers, with Rodríguez de Bastidas and Vasco Nuñez de Balboa at the head, to the recent signing of the Carter-Torrijos Treaty, the history of Panama has been sung step by step by its anonymous and inspired troubadours: either as improvised chroniclers of Old Panama a thousand times besieged by cruel pirates or as courageous fighters for the sovereignty of Panama, until seeing its tricolor flag fly over the Canal Zone.

Interview with Nicomedes for the award to chapter VIII. October. 1986

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Capítulo IX: Los trovadores aztecas

Orígenes del son mexicano / El son jarocho y el zapateado / El son huasteco y el huapango / Las valonas michoacanas y veracruzanas / El mariachi: del "arpero" al "vocalista"

 

Capítulo X: Los trovadores de los llanos

El joropo: canto del llano / Arpa, cuatro y maracas / Formas musicales del joropo / Los cantadores y el contrapunteo / Del legendario "Quirpa" al literario "Cantaclaro"

 

Capítulo XI: Los trovadores brasileños (gaúchos y violeros)

El gaúcho de Río Grande do Sul / Romancero del Brasil / La "literatura del cordel" / El Nordeste en la obra de Marcus Pereira / Los violeiros nordestinos: a. Canto a. "Meia Quadra"; b. Canto por "Oito a Quadrâo"; c. El "Galope a Beira-mar"; d. El "Martelo agalopado"

 

Capítulo XII: El "Canto a lo pueta" de Chile.

Antecedentes de la trova chilena / Las formas literarias / Los instrumentos musicales / Orígenes de la pallada / Famoso contrapunto entre Taguada y la Rosa / Violeta Parra / Glosas y Cuecas

 

Capítulo XIII: El arte de los payadores

El gaucho payador / El payador de las patriadas / El payador Santos Vega / El gaucho Martín Fierro / El payador urbano / Don Atahualpa Yupanqui.

 

Capítulo XIV: El canto del altiplano

Las culturas del Lago Titicaca / Del Tiawanacu al Tawatinsuyu / Quena, siku, tarka y pinkullo / Diabladas y Morenadas / "Los Jairas" y Benjo Cruz: testimonios

 

Capítulo XV: Los decimistas peruanos

La décima glosada en el Perú / La décima en los pasquines de Túpac Amaru / El yaraví de Mariano Melgar / El criollismo de Abelardo Gamarra / El "socabón" de Nicomedes Santa Cruz.

 

Capítulo XVI: Los trovadores ecuatorianos

Música de los Shyris del Reino de Quito / El "rondador" y la "quena" ecuatorianos / Cómo nació "Vasija de Barro" / Solistas y dúos ecuatorianos / Los negros de Esmeraldas.

 

Capítulo XVII: Colombia canta

 

Capítulo XVIII: Cancionero centroamericano

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Cancionero de España y América.

1987

 

Guión, Realización: Nicomedes Santa Cruz;

Locución: Nicomedes Santa Cruz / Aurora de Andrés.

 

Capítulo I. Introducción al Cancionero de España y América. (Siglos XV al XVII). (26:19).

This first chapter is an introduction to the Cancionero de España y América. It covers the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, but still goes back to the Spanish Middle Ages to find the origins of the Cancionero in the Cantigas of Alfonso X, its definition and delimitation of troubadours and minstrels. At the same time, we investigate a romancero in Pre-Columbian America, gleaning in the Aztec and Inca civilizations. Thus, we enter a songbook of the indigenous evangelization, the popular theater of "Moors and Christians" recreated in America, to finish with the carnivals of the Andean world..

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Capítulo II. Proyección del Cancionero de España y América. (Siglos XVIII al XX). (26:26).

It begins with the acculturation of the old romancero and its gradual Americanization; thanks to this ebb and flow, the Mexican corrido will emerge. Also the woman, next to the colonizer, is the bearer of the cultural complex as an oral and memoristic vehicle. The alternate or controversial singing is already present in Spain in the "jotas de picadillo" of Aragon, in the "trovos" of La Union (Murcia) or in the "trovos" of Las Alpujarras (Granada). But this same song in counterpoint becomes joropo in the voice of the Venezuelan llanero, or punto in the inspiration of the Cuban guajiro and milonga in the wise philosophy of the Argentinean payador.

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Capítulo III. Trovadores de la América Precolombina (Siglo XV). (26:00)

Here we approach the cuycapicque or composers of songs in the Aztec world; evoking the figure of the monarch and major troubadour Netzahualcoyotl, king of Tezcoco (XV century). After the chants in the Nahuatl language, we will find some examples in the Purepecha language, to finally enter into "the poetry of the Inca amautas, who are philosophers, and hurawicus, who are poets" and express themselves in the Quechua and Aymara languages

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Capítulo IV. Romancero de la conquista del Nuevo Mundo. (Siglo XVI). (26:48)

Here we gather the impressions of Christopher Columbus in his voyages of discovery, impressions transcribed by Bartolomé de las Casas, to immediately approach a sort of "vision of the vanquished" in three concrete instances: Moctezuma and Malinche in Mexico, Atahualpa and Pizarro in the Tawantinsuyu and Caupolicán and Ercilla in Arauco. Epilogue of the program is given by Nicarao with Diriangen and Gil González de Avila (1523) and the discovery of the immense "Mar Dulce" or Lake Nicaragua.

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Capítulo V. Romancero de España y América (Siglos XVI - XVII) (26:19)

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Capítulo VI. Romancero de España y América (Siglos XVIII-XX)(26:26)

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Capítulo VII. Cancionero de la Evangelización Indígena (Siglos XVI-XVII). (25:45)

It contains the first testimonies of the Cancionero de la Evangelización Indígena en el Nuevo Mundo, at the beginning of the sixteenth century: the apparitions of the Apostle Santiago in the midst of the conquest struggle in favor of the Castilians. The apparition of the Virgin Guadalupe to the Indian Juan Diego on the hill of Tepeyac, in Mexico. The cult and pilgrimage of the Virgin of Chiquinquirá, in Venezuela and Colombia. The brotherhoods of black slaves in the first celebrations of Corpus Christi in America. The origin of the multitudinous cult to the image of the Señor de los Milagros, in seventeenth century Lima, closes this chapter.

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Capítulo VIII. Cancionero de la Evangelización Indígena (Siglos XVIII-XX) (26:00)

A calendar of religious festivities is outlined based on the songbook of the American evangelization: it begins with songs of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to continue with the so-called "Velorios de la Cruz de Mayo", the celebration of St. John the Baptist on June 24 and St. James the Apostle on July 25. The Christmas cycle closes this chapter with the "aguinaldos" (traditional Christmas celebrations) prior to Easter and the "Bajada de los Santos Reyes" (the Descent of the Holy Kings) on January 6.

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Capítulo IX. Cantos de Trabajo. (26:06)

It begins with the Work Songs of the pre-Columbian indigenous communities, whose society was characterized by work and common property. The Spanish irruption is present under the symbolism of a plowing song. Colonial urbanism is marked by the cries of black slaves and horros. The republican problems of the incipient proletariat are manifested in the miners' canora protest. This outline ends with the two faces of the current labor problems: men without work and women without rest.

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Capítulo X. Cantos del medio familiar y social. (25:50)

It begins with lullabies on both sides of the Atlantic, to continue with Chilean and Peruvian children's songs. Then we move on to love songs from Mexico and arrive at wedding songs from Palencia (Spain) and Jalisco (Mexico). Closing the chapter we have a nursery rhyme, whose origins are as Spanish as those of most of the songs that illustrate this cycle.

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Capítulo XI. Canto en controversia o contrapunto: El canto a lo divino (26:41)

The two sides of this disc deal with alternate chant in repentistas controversy, whose origins can lead us to the bucolic alternate chant of the Virgilian shepherds in Ancient Europe. But the first side is specifically dedicated to the so-called "canto a lo divino", originated in the medieval mester clerecía that arose as a response to the mester de juglaría. From the "auroros" of Alicante to the Caribbean "velorios del Niño Jesús", we trace this chant to the divine on both sides of the Atlantic, finding true treasures of popular lyric from the Greater Antilles to the Southern Cone.

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Capítulo XII. Canto en controversia o contrapunto: El canto a lo humano. (26:00)

It deals with all kinds of worldly topics, but always in this tonic of alternate singing in improvisers' counterpoint, with its intangible rules: two or more contestants, one or several judges and the audience, who encourages and bets on their favorites. Besides the different modalities and contrapuntal themes, we show some examples of historical controversies, such as the one in Chile in 1790 between La Rosa and Tahuada, or the very contemporary one between two Cuban giants: Joseíto Fernández, the true author of the "Guantanamera", against the most popular Cuban singer of all times: Benny Moré, "the King of melody" or "The Barbarian of Rhythm".

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Capítulo XIII. Canarias: puente entre las dos orillas. (25:52)

We consider that an approach to the Songbook of Spain and America must necessarily pass through the "Fortunate Islands", just as Christopher Columbus did five hundred years ago, from the first to the last of his four voyages of "Mutual Discovery". After an introduction by that meteoric conjunction of Canary galaxies that was the "Taburiente" Group, we have a testimony of the extinct Guanche aborigines: the "Sirinoque", from the 15th century. "Los Arrieros" interpret this picaresque song-dance. Only between the Greater Antilles and Venezuela they gather at the present time more than half a million of canaries, but who can count what is integrated definitively, like the canaries of New Orleans...? And who can dispute to Mexico the autochthony of its "son petenera" nor to Venezuela its malagueñas, fulías and aguinaldos; or to Peru and Chile the paternity of the "Palmero"...?

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Capítulo XIV. Cantos de ida y vuelta (28:18)

It contains the fourteenth and last chapter of this series. As we say in the script: in these fourteen chapters we have only tried to "demonstrate that there is, at least, a triple path (musical, dance and poetic) in the transit towards a Songbook of the Hispanic Community of Nations".

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Proyección del Cancionero Español

1989 

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Guión, Realización: Nicomedes Santa Cruz;

Locución: Nicomedes Santa Cruz / Aurora de Andrés

 

Enero de 1989.

Lado A. Nanas peninsulares. (25:18) // Lado B. Arrorró canario y arrullos americanos. (27:08)The proposal is to outline our Hispanic identity through the PROJECTION OF SPANISH SONGS, analyzing comparatively the parallelism that exists between the two shores. And as it has always been said that traditional knowledge comes to us with our mother's milk, we have dedicated the first two chapters of this album to lullabies, whether they are called "nanas", "arrorró" or "cantigas de ninar". LA CANCIÓN DE CUNA is nourished by Hispanic folklore and at the same time enriches it, creating a highly lyrical genre. On the other hand, with the lullabies migrated to the New World this very Spanish need of the word "to keep the child pending of the mother's lips" -as García Lorca detected in his famous essay on "Children's Lullabies"-, and not always to express pleasant things while sleep comes, "but it enters him fully in the crude reality and infiltrates him with the dramatism of the world".

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Febrero de 1989.

Lado A. Rondas infantiles peninsulares. (25:43) // Lado B. Rondas infantiles iberoamericanas.

The children's rondas, the coplas de corro or coplas for jumping rope, the cabalistic letrillas to "rule" or draw positions and places at the beginning of games with penalties, in short, all this vast traditional and folkloric repertoire that has almost disappeared from the courtyards and neighborhood squares, is preserved in the peninsular schools thanks to the functional work given by educators, especially priests and sisters of religious schools. It is mainly to them that we owe the transculturation of this rich vein from Spain to America. Thus, old and new romances, transformed into children's rondas, as well as Christmas carols and aguinaldos, have become first class pedagogical material. Had it not been for those hard-working kindergarten teachers and those patient elementary school teachers, the rondas would have disappeared, and with them that quota of tender drama, ingenuous choreography and fresh musicality.

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Marzo de 1989.

Lado A. La canción enamorada I. (25:36) // Lado B. La canción enamorada II (26:16)

The origins of the song in love go back to the 14th century, in whose early years Guilhem Molinier compiled the Leys d'Amors. Until then, women were sung as a place to be conquered for temporary enjoyment. According to Carlos Alvar in the introduction to his anthology on "Poetry of Troubadours, Trouvéres and Minnesinger", there was total incompatibility between love and marriage, since only the married lady had legal entity in the Middle Ages: "The maiden cannot possess vassals and, therefore, neither lovers, according to the conception of courtly love". This principle makes the relationship between troubadour and lady as secret as possible, because both the honor of the lady and the life of the poet are in danger. With courtly love comes a transfer of feudal lexicon, whereby the poet treats his lady as a vassal, calling her "my lord" and "my master". The "boom" of the love song in Latin America is quite late, since it crystallizes in the bolero - romantic genre par excellence - since the first decades of the present century. From the emergence of the Old Cuban Trova, created by José "Pepe" Sánchez in the second half of the 19th century, to the emergence of the New Cuban Trova, from the sixties of the present century, there is a brilliant period led by Cuba and Mexico first and Argentina and Brazil later, which we can well qualify as the "Golden Century of the Ibero-American Song in Love"

 

Abril de 1989.

Lado A. La canción amorosa I (25:24) // Lado B. La canción amorosa II (27:18)

In the previous chapters, dedicated to the Song in Love, we have seen how the norms established from the top in certain hierarchical societies, focus on everything that constitutes ceremonial and etiquette: birth, marriage, funerals and war events are framed in a great apparatus of formalities and solemnity. The love courtship takes the form of an elaborate game, where poetry, music and song are fundamentally involved. The present disc, entirely dedicated to the LOVE SONG, should not require further commentary as it is an extension of the already treated Song in Love, except to specify that now it is not only about the couple and their love request, but that, starting from the being abstracted in his intimate and deep Self, we launch ourselves after the song to Love as source of life, as infinite force, as irrepressible desire and as the only power capable of claiming eternity.

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Mayo de 1989.

Lado A. Pregones callejeros (27:00) // Lado B. El pregón teatralizado (25:00)

The old types are slowly but inexorably becoming extinct, they are being lost from sight, and there are many people today who are unaware of their cultural background and ancestral customs. Not only foreigners, but even people born in this or that city, ignore the transformations that certain things have undergone. These pregones -prehistoria publicitaria I would call them-, have from their birth a melody that triumphs of the time and some verses that prevent their total oblivion. Recreated by musicians and poets, compiled and analyzed by researchers, always taken up by the people, the pregones are linked to cultural identity. And from its popular roots, the pregón rises to the demands of bel canto, but without making concessions.

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Junio de 1989

Lado A. Raíces de la música afrohispánica (27:28) // La Habanera, orígenes y proyección (27:40)

It can be well assured today that the cabildos of Africans date back to the 14th century, more than a hundred years before the discovery of America. "Of the Afro-Cuban cabildos, as well as of their foremen, there are undoubted and very old historical antecedents in Seville, as we see in the chronicles of Ortíz de Zúñiga (1474), who refers to the dances and parties of the African slaves in the Andalusian capital during the reign of Don Enrique III (that is, 1390), and to the institution of a mayoral among them as chief and judge of all, with whom the authorities understood each other" (Fernando Ortíz Fernández: Orbita de Fernando Ortiz. Havana, Havana, Cuba, 1474). (Fernando Ortíz Fernández: Orbita de Fernando Ortiz. Havana, 1973). The European contradanza (born among the Normans), is brought to Cuba by the French towards the end of the VXIII century. From it was born the Creole contradanza as a Cuban dance genre, within the so-called "cuadro" pieces. As time went by, it lost its collective aspect, becoming a dance of couples. The well-known Cuban dance is nothing more than this same musical phenomenon. The later Cuban danzón has its immediate antecedent in the Cuban dance. Towards the second half of the 19th century, the Creole dance loses its choreography and begins to be a singable genre, thus the Habanera was born.

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Julio de 1989.

Lado A. La canción danzaria: los tangos. (27:30) // La canción danzaria: la rumba (26:48)

In his comprehensive essay entitled Afro-American Black Music, (Bs.As., 1978) its author, John Sotrm Roberts, writes: "... the Spanish taste for double or triple meter in the same piece of music, shared by many African groups, facilitated the adoption and retention of the African polyrhythmic approach of double and triple together..." (p. 62) There is a rhythmic pattern widespread in the black music of the Americas. It is the basic rhythm of Cuban habanera, Argentine tango, Dominican merengue and many Trinidadian calipsos. Oneyda Alvarenga says it is widely used in Brazilian music. Storm Roberts also finds it in Puerto Rican dance and notes that it is "very similar to the rhythm of the Andalusian tango of Spain".

The word "rumba" comes from Spain, but not from the dance. It is a reference to the word used to describe the women of the so-called "happy life", and so it was said: "mujeres de rumbo", "mulatas de rumbo". From the beginning, the rumba was marked by the most absolute prejudice due to its very humble origin and the choreography, which is a ritual pantomime of the sexual act.... When the dance ceased to have an initiatory religious content and became "the rumba", it did not become a frivolous manifestation. It was and is, a party that Man gives himself.

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Agosto de 1989

Lado A. Zarzuelas de la otra orilla I. (27:30) // Lado B. Zarzuelas de la otra orilla II. (27:00)

Zarzuela is a dramatic-musical genre in one or several acts, with alternative sequences of spoken and sung parts. This genre, characteristically Spanish and related to French comic opera, Viennese and Italian operettas and Anglo-Saxon musical comedy, dates back to the seventeenth century in its origins, reaching its peak in nineteenth-century Spain. Under that influence, already in the present century, the zarzuela arises on the other side of the Atlantic, standing out for its autochthonous contributions the Cuban zarzuela. The Teatro Martí, the Teatro Alhambra and the Teatro Regina, just to mention a few stages where Gonzalo Roig, Eliseo Grenet, Rodrigo Prats, Amadeo Roldán and the prolific Ernesto Lecuona premiered their works, keep the history of this Cuban zarzuela, also heir to the Cuban buffo theater, founded by Francisco Covarrubias and developed by Jorge Anckerman.

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Septiembre de 1989

Lado A. Ensalmos y conjuros (27:30) // Lado B. El Diablo en nuestro Cancionero (27:10)

Ensalmo is understood as the superstitious way of healing with prayers and empirical remedies. The shamanic chant of the natives of the New World is an expression of a sacred nature, whose function is to invoke the assistance of the mystical powers of their protective manes: animals and plants. Conjure is understood as the action and effect of conjuring demons, as well as to say against them the prayers and exorcisms arranged by the Catholic Church. Before man was born the Devil, and his history is so ancient that it is not even recorded in Genesis; we know it by oral tradition and the books of Sacred History. In Christianity, the Devil is a being originally good and extraordinarily beautiful, called Luzbel and created by God; an angel who then falls into disgrace by an act of pride, condemning himself and becoming the enemy of universal salvation. Thus, Luzbel becomes Lucifer or Satan.

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Octubre de 1989

Lado A. La canción religiosa (26:34) // La canción religiosa (continuación) (26:37)

The oldest edition of religious music known in the New World was printed in Mexico in 1556, it is an "Ordinarium Missae" that testified to the diffusion of Gregorian chant and the needs of a means of evolution. Fray Pedro de Gante founded shortly before his death in 1572, the first center of musical diffusion, the "Schola Cantorum" of Texcoco. As in the Viceroyalty of New Spain, a period of true splendor for religious music in South America began in the middle of the 16th century. The archives of the cathedrals and chapels of Quito, Cuzco, Potosí and Lima tell of a rich artistic past and bear witness to the musicians who served as chapel masters there. The evangelization of the Indians under the encomienda regime, as well as the catechization of the enslaved blacks, was based on a songbook and the popularity of the autos sacramentales. In Afro-American cultures, it is not possible to speak of religious song without making special reference to the role played by women in the transmission of the oral tradition.

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Octubre de 1989

Lado A. Misas folklóricas y criollas. (26:00) // Lado B. Misas comunitarias. (26:25)

The Misa Flamenca is an Andalusian glossary for the Spanish Mass composed by Fernández de Latorre and José Torregrosa in 1966. The "Misa Flamenca" completes the trilogy that began this genre with the "Misa Luba" by Father Guido Haazen, in 1962, to continue with the Argentinean "Misa Criolla" by Ariel Ramirez, in 1964. This process is directly related to the recommendations of the Second Vatican Council on the need to adapt the Liturgy and sacred art to the idiosyncrasy of the different peoples. This phenomenon of liturgical folklorization produced in Latin America a sequel of Creole and folkloric Masses, while in Spain regional Masses proliferated in the seventies. The Community Masses are the fruit of the post-conciliar process, since its conclusions were applied in Latin America by the Medellin Conference. And because in this new way of doing theology the Christian base communities are the protagonists of the "option for the poor", the liturgical adaptations of these ecclesial communities, such as the "Nicaraguan Peasant Mass" or the "Mass of the Quilombos", have been called "Community Masses".

 

Noviembre de 1989

Lado A. La Canción Social I. (26:50) // Lado B. La Canción Social II. (27:24)

The two sides are entirely dedicated to a fundamental aspect of the so-called Nueva Canción Iberoamericana, which is THE SOCIAL SONG. But we are not going to theorize about this phenomenon that gained strength in the sixties. We are just going to offer you a brief selection of themes that will be preceded by poems in the voice of their own authors.

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