Avantgarde bandoneon

I got a six month grant from Kone Foundation on January 2019. I never imagined where this project would take me. Avantgarde Bandoneon has expanded my limits and structures. It made me make a big effort investigating and finding out new ways of working. And then it helped me understand why the avant-garde movement was so eager in finding new ways and in experimenting. I even experienced a personal crisis because my “safe” world was changing, my own barriers started to move and some of them started to disappear.

Even though the grant finished on last June, I continue working on this project. I would have never guessed that it would be life-changing in a positive way. What I thought it would take half a year is taking longer and I will share with you in detail what I have done and what is still in process.

In the first part of my project I dedicated to collect the material I dind ́t have (I had already a couple of scores and recordings). I started by getting in touch with the University of California where there is a large avant-garde music archive. They sent me books, scans of the scores and of some composer’s scratches. I also got access to their digital archive. I was surprised of their kindness and interest in this project.
While studying the material I faced some problems. Some of the pieces where made out of an idea or were impossible to play again exactly the same as it was done the first time. I had to make some decisions:

- Do I have to copy the pieces? For example, listen to them, transcribe what is possible and try to imitate what they did.
- Do I have to make new pieces using their ideas?
- Do I have to combine or intervene the pieces? For example, use parts of the recordings and create a piece that includes “old” and “new”? How do I consider ownership and copyright?
- Do I have to go analogue when thinking of the electronic elements (I came up with the Vintage music making” idea) or do I use digital devices as well? The pieces were originally made entirely analogically.

Maybe these questions look simple and only belonging to the aesthetics of the pieces. But for me they have been challenging. Why? Because I am mainly a classical musician. I was trained to respect the wishes of the composers and to try to play as faithfully as the score or the guidelines indicate. So the idea of making the pieces my own, undo them, take what I need and recreate them was challenging at this point of the project. I felt that my other world, the tango, was approaching the classical world.

I participated in the Moffice, which I found inspiring and useful. To have the chance of sharing our projects
and at the same time work on them in the same space has boost my confidence and intentionality. In the
moffice days I studied a program called MAX MSP, a visual programming language for music and multimedia. I started to work on programming for the pieces that needed it.

In some of the pieces, the performer not only plays the bandoneon or manipulate the electronic devices but also acts, moves and dances. The composers of this project worked with Merce Cunningham and his company. This made a change on their approach to the use of the body of the musician. They enlarged the body expression experience during the performances. This is why I started to investigate this dance company, I watched videos and took some dance lessons to understand their approach.

I had meetings with different contemporary dancers and musicians. We had sessions using the piece Mesa as a starting point to create a language together. These sessions help me understand some aspects that I had to readjust in the way I was approaching some aspects of the pieces. I found out that I had to move my limits and think differently again.

I consider that my project Avantgarde Bandoneon is still a work in progress. There are some pieces I performed, I made a whole concert using one idea that came from one piece and there are some pieces that I still haven't managed to prepare since the level of technical difficulty they embrace (for example, the building of a giant seesaw, or the connection of 20 microphones to 20 speakers, these are projects that involve a group of people). I am still working on the latter pieces, which will be recreations.

Through this project I have to moved people, made them connect with these old composers but also connect to their inner expression and freedom. The process has been filmed and recorded in order to share this project in the future through internet. I continue with it since I find it such a rich area of exploration and I will be forever thankful with Kone Foundation for giving me a working grant.