Edgar Guzmán

Aeolian lyra (2011)

12 strings lirone (without bourdon strings)

Aeolian lyra (2011)

to Kivie Cahn-Lipman

PERFORMANCE NOTES 1) A SHORT BACKGROUND

Historically, the lirone has never been a solo instrument. From the 16th through the early 18th century (the time when it seems to have fall out of general use) the lirone’s musical role was very well stablished and restricted. Despite its revival interest in the middle of the 20th century within the academic circles, i.e. researchers and performers (albeit very few of the last ones), it’s still an unpromoted instrument among the contemporary composers in comparison to some other historical instruments as the viola da gamba or viola d’amore. It was this ‘quality’ that led me to choose the lirone out of other historical instruments after the cellist Kivie Cahn-Lipman offered me the unique opportunity of writing such a piece.

2) TUNING

For this piece, the most common tuning system of a 12 strings lirone without bourdon strings was used:

3) PAST AND FUTURE

This piece is build upon two main aesthetic principles. The first one, consisting of sections A, B, and C -which harmonic field is loosely based on that from Henry Cowell’s piano piece Aeolian harp-, stands as the more tradition-committed instance of the piece given its underlaying harmonic-oriented development (that is, in spite of the use of contemporary string ‘extended’ techniques).

The second one, represented by section D, is a natural expansion of an ongoing personal series of musical works titled Estudios espectrales (Spectral studies) in which a very specific type of graphical ‘notation’ is used as a way for ‘depersonalizing’ the original instrumental or ‘historical’ context. In the first version of this series, for instance, the specific identity of the musical excerpts from which the spectrum forming the piece were ‘extracted’ (that is, a diversity of ‘paradigmatic’ musical examples from the contemporary academic musical repertoire) is kept from performer's knowledge as a way of disseminating the original, well defined identity into a multiplicity of branches by means of an endless chain of subjective lectures, creating new musical material every time.

In this piece however, the ‘spectral notation’ used in section D is meant to represent specific but undefined playing actions: specific in account of the parts of the instrument that are to be involved in the performance of this section (a changing set of strings and/or lirone’s body), specific dynamics, and also, because its main sound aesthetic quality will be provided by the use of ‘extended techniques’. Yet, it is undefined because the extended techniques to be used are open to the subjective interpretation and player’s will, this way opening a door for the lirone to be both a recipient, at different degrees, of a set of ‘non-

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SPECIAL THANKS

To Kivie Cahn-Lipman, because without his enthusiasm this piece wouldn’t exist. And to G. Victor Penniman, for sharing his enlightening and most valuable work ‘LA LYRA D’ ORFEO: A practical manual of technique and performance practice for the lirone’.

PROGRAM NOTES

We don’t inherit the land from our ancestors. We borrow it from our descendants. (Massaï proverb) ABOUT THE COMPOSER Edgar Guzmán (b. 1981, Mexico) is a freelance composer of acoustic and electronic music. His work has been performed at several new music festivals in Mexico, United States, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Venezuela, Austria, France, Poland and Germany. He has been recipient of several grants and distinctions such as the Queretaro State Institute of Culture and Arts' Young Creators Grant 2002 and 2004, National System for Musical Promotion's Annual Commissioning Program 2003, 31st International Competition of Electroacoustic Music and Sonic Art Bourges Residencè Award in 2004, Guanajuato State Intitute of Culture and Arts' Young Composers Specialization Grant 2005, National Fund for the Culture and Arts’ Young Creators Grant in 2006 and again in 2009, Artistic Projects Sponsorship Program granted by the Mexican Youth Institute in 2006, and 2011 FONCA-Conacyt Artistic Residence Program. His musical production is comprised of commissioned by and dedicatory pieces to a number of institutions, ensembles and performers such as Wilfrido Terrazas, Alexander Bruck, Rebekah Heller, Kivie Canh-Lipman, Ryan Muncy, I-Chen Yeh, Ensamble Liminar, Ensamble de Música Contemporánea de la Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Orquesta Sinfónica Juvenil de México, Camerata de las Américas and the International Contemporary Ensemble among others.

Email: manzuge@yahoo.com.mx!!

SPECIAL THANKS

To Kivie Cahn-Lipman, because without his enthusiasm and friendship this piece wouldn’t exist. And to G. Victor Penniman, for sharing his enlightening and most valuable work ‘LA LYRA D’ ORFEO: A practical manual of technique and performance practice for the lirone’. ABOUT THE COMPOSER Edgar Guzmán (b. 1981, Mexico) is a freelance composer of acoustic and electronic music. His work has been performed at several new music festivals in Mexico, United States, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Venezuela, Austria, France, Poland and Germany. He has been recipient of several grants and distinctions such as the Queretaro State Institute of Culture and Arts' Young Creators Grant 2002 and 2004, National System for Musical Promotion's Annual Commissioning Program 2003, 31st International Competition of Electroacoustic Music and Sonic Art Bourges Residencè Award in 2004, Guanajuato State Intitute of Culture and Arts' Young Composers Specialization Grant 2005, National Fund for the Culture and Arts’ Young Creators Grant in 2006 and again in 2009, Artistic Projects Sponsorship Program granted by the Mexican Youth Institute in 2006, and 2011 FONCA-Conacyt Artistic Residence Program. His musical production is comprised of commissioned by and dedicatory pieces to a number of institutions, ensembles and performers such as Wilfrido Terrazas, Alexander Bruck, Rebekah Heller, Kivie Canh-Lipman, Ryan Muncy, I-Chen Yeh, Ensamble Liminar, Ensamble de Música Contemporánea de la Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Orquesta Sinfónica Juvenil de México, Camerata de las Américas and the International Contemporary Ensemble among others.

Email: manzuge@yahoo.com.mx!!

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA.

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