THE TAMING OF THE HARP
Have you heard the Taoist tale of the Taming of the Harp?
Once in the hoary ages in the Ravine of Lungmen stood a Kiri tree, a veritable king of the forest. It reared its head to talk to the stars; its roots struck deep into the earth, mingling their bronzed coils with those of the silver dragon that slept beneath.
And it came to pass that a mighty wizard made of this tree a wondrous harp, whose stubborn spirit should be tamed but by the greatest of musicians.
For long the instrument was treasured by the Emperor of China, but all in vain were the efforts of those who in turn tried to draw melody from its strings.
In response to their utmost strivings there came from the harp but harsh notes of disdain, contrepoint ill-according with the songs they fain would sing. The harp refused to recognise a master. At last came Peiwoh, the prince of harpists. With tender hand he caressed the harp as one might seek to soothe an unruly horse, and softly touched the chords.
He sang of nature and the seasons, of high mountains and flowing waters, and all the memories of the tree awoke!
Once more the sweet breath of spring played amidst its branches. The young cataracts, as they danced down the ravine, laughed to the budding flowers. Anon were heard the dreamy voices of summer with its myriad insects, the gentle pattering of rain, the wail of the cuckoo. quand nous Hark! a tiger roars,-the valley answers again. It is autumn; in the desert night, sharp like a monie, un sword gleams the moon upon the frosted grass. Now winter reigns, and through the snow- O pour votre filled air swirl flocks of swans and rattling hailstones beat upon the boughs with fierce delight.
Then Peiwoh changed the key and sang of love. The forest swayed like an ardent swain deep lost in thought. On high, like a haughty maiden, swept a cloud bright and fair; but passing, trailed long shadows on the ground, black like despair.
Again the mode was changed; Peiwoh sang of war, of clashing steel and trampling steeds. And in the harp arose the tempest of Lungmen, the dragon rode the lightning, the thundering avalanche crashed through the hills.
In ecstasy the Celestial monarch asked Peiwoh wherein lay the secret of his victory. "Sire," he replied, "others have failed because they sang but of themselves. I left the harp to choose its theme, and knew not truly whether the harp had been Peiwoh or Peiwoh were the harp."
OKAKURA KAKUZO
The Tea Book, chap. V (The Sense of the Art)
PEIWOH
Long ago, in the East, the harp was born: a bow and five strings embraced by human hands... Persia, Egypt, Greece, Celtic culture and Asia were its cradle. The Taoist tale of Peiwoh reveals the mystery of art as a magical process, and tells us how once, long ago, artistic creation was experienced as a sacred act. This metaphor of the harp teaches that each of us can be transformed into a tree and become a harp, an instrument, allowing music to fill our body and our soul. In Zen philosophy, the sense of emptiness is fundamental if we are to fill ourselves afresh with life; before we can breathe in fresh air, we must expel the air we have in our lungs; thus, emptying ourselves like the harpist Peiwoh, we can fill our being with new air, with music which flows through us as if we were the strings of a harp, vibrating to the sweet breath of a breeze, becoming an aeolian harp, the harp of the wind.
Peiwoh represents a breathing-in of various traditions which have helped me to create and give expression to my musical world, and one of the sources on which I have drawn most deeply is early music and the art of improvisation: an infinite source of inspiration. From the time that I began to compose and sing songs, it became more and more natural to me to accompany myself on the triple harp, and I was fascinated by the depth and subtlety of the Italian Baroque harp. It has a rich, enveloping sonority which is unlike that of any other harp. Although originating in the Baroque period, it has a very modern, richly chromatic sound palette which s ideally suited to the spirit of my songs, gently caressing the voice without ever overpowering it. There are moments on the album when we hear a small Gothic harp, with its warm, remote and yet direct sound; and the most ancient of them all is a Celtic harp, with its magical, ancestral sounds. I am grateful to Rainer Thurau and Franz Reschenhofer for their great creative skill, which has enabled me to share and forge new paths and experiences with these wonderful instruments. Another of my sources of inspiration is traditional music, with its close links to early music! Nor can I forget my early, long apprenticeship in the world of Classical and Romantic music.
Peiwoh brings together the various languages, colours and sounds that I heard as a child growing up in Switzerland, at home with my parents, friends and other musicians. And each of them expresses and encapsulates a different part of myself. Each language has its own rhythm and melody, which it modulates in its own distinct way, influencing and inspiring the character and style of the song. Poetry is one of the essential aspects of this musical journey. Thank you, David Escamilla, for the discovery of your poetry and the legend of Peiwoh in Jardi de Silencis.
Peiwoh leads us to the process of maturing, which has sometimes been painful and dramatic: life contains within it "little deaths", as in the poem by García Lorca, Canción de la muerte pequeña. In his short but intense poem Corazón: muere o canta, Juan Ramón Jiménez shows how music and life overcome fear, giving us the courage to walk on, as if our awareness of the proximity of death gave us a heightened awareness of life and its infinite possibilities. And there are also the distant echoes of a "silent music", an almost imperceptible music which, in the depths of night, mingles with nature. It is then that music embraces silence and the two are entwined like lovers.
The instrumentation I have used in Peiwoh is based on three important elements which establish a dialogue and contribute a variety of colours and moods. A fundamental and essential element in Mediterranean culture is rhythm. Percussion has always been an inseparable part of the music of poetry, and the partnership of these two very different but inseparable instruments stretches back to ancient times. I want to thank Pedro and David for creating the wonderful atmospheres and landscapes which spark our imagination. And I also want to thank Manuel Mohino for having captured all those atmospheres and landscapes, rhythms and melodies, sounds and silences with such naturalness and beauty.
The third element is the sound of plucked and strummed strings. There are several kinds of guitar, the majority with metal strings, such as the acoustic guitar and the santur -a Persian psaltery- which mingle with the sound of the harp to create a beautiful sound tapestry that is rich in harmonics. The hardingfele is an ancient traditional Norwegian fiddle, with sympathetic strings. sounds like another, almost human voice, which floats delicately between the sound of the harp and the human voice. The rhythm of the double-bass provides a counterpoint to the harp, adding a vibrant and expressive depth of sound. Thank you, Javier, Dimitri, Mario, Petter and Bjørn, for your boundless dedication and creativity!
The final element, the most ethereal of all, is the human voice. From the very beginnings of music, voice and harp have been constant travelling companions through very different periods and styles... They are two almost inseparable entities, like body and soul, and accompanying oneself on the harp involves a different, perhaps more intimate way of singing which is closer to the instrument and the words. The voices of Petter and Ferran are very different, but when the three of us sing together in Prayer and Naonunal, there is harmony, complicity and a range of intense emotions which are the fruit of the experiences we have shared. Thank you, Petter and Ferran, for your gift of tenderness and beauty.
ARIANNA SAVALL
Bellaterra, 8th March, 2009
Preghiera/Prayer
Dove è odio, fa ch'io porti l'Amore,
Dove è offesa, ch'io porti il Perdono,
Dove è discordia, ch'io porti l'Unione,
Dove è dubbio, ch'io porti la Fede,
Dove è errore, ch'io porti la Verità,
Dove è disperazione, ch'io porti la Speranza,
Dove è tristezza, ch'io porti la Gioia,
Dove sono le tenebre, ch'io porti la Luce.
Maestro, fa che io non cerchi tanto
Ad esser consolato, quanto a consolare;
Ad essere compreso, quanto a comprendere;
Ad essere amato, quanto ad amare.
Poiché, così è:
Dando, che si riceve;
Perdonando, che si è perdonati;
Morendo, che si risuscita a Vita Eterna.
Where there is hatred, I shall bring love
Where there is offense, I shall bring forgiveness
Where there is discord, I shall bring unity
Where there is doubt, I shall bring faith
Where there is error, I shall bring truth
Where there is despair, I shall bring hope
Where there is sadness, I shall bring joy
Where there is darkness, I shall bring light
O, Divine Master,
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive
It is in forgiving that we are forgiven
El Llenguatge Dels Ocells/The Language of Birds
"From far away comes a song of the birds that talked with St. Francis. have written a song to the words of this beautiful poem, an invocation to nature, and to the birds that never tire of singing, while the moon looks on pensively from infinite space..."
Com canvien dies i coses!
De vegades, sentim el lleu brunzir dels insectes
quan cau una fruita,
o els secrets de les ones
mentre llisquen entre els esculls.
Així és com nosaltres
despertem i ens adormim,
provem d'estimar o, més sovint, patim.
Es mouen els dies, passen les coses.
Però els canvis no neixen a fora
-creixen dins nostre,
prop de l'ombra de la lluna.
Quan assolim el llenguatge dels ocells,
aquests no aprenen a parlar,
som nosaltres els qui
trobem la drecera que mena al repòs.
How the days and all things change!
Sometimes, we hear the soft buzzing of insects
as a fruit falls,
or the secrets of the waves
as they slip among the rocks.
And so it is with us:
we wake and fall asleep,
we seek to love, but, more often, we suffer.
The days pass and things happen.
But the changes do not take place
outside -
they grow within us,
close to the shadow of the moon.
When we grasp the language of birds,
it is not because they have learned to
speak,
but because we have found
the path that leads to rest.
Liebes-Lied/Love Song
Wie soll ich meine Seele halten, daß
sie nicht an deine rührt? Wie soll ich sie
hinheben über dich zu andern Dingen?
Ach gerne möcht ich sie bei irgendwas
Verlorenem im Dunkel unterbringen
an einer fremden stillen Stelle, die
nicht weiterschwingt, wenn deine Tiefen schwingen.
Doch alles, was uns anrührt, dich und mich,
nimmt uns zusammen wie ein Bogenstrich,
der aus zwei Saiten eine Stimme zieht.
Auf welches Instrument sind wir gespannt?
Und welcher [Geiger]1 hat uns in der Hand?
O süßes Lied.
How shall I contain my soul, that
It does not stir yours? How shall I
raise it up past you to other things?
Ah, gladly would I shelter it with something
Lost in the dark.
In some secret, quiet place
that does not resonate when your depths resound.
Yet everything that touches you and me,
Unites us in a single stroke of the bow
From two strings drawing a single voice.
On what instrument are we stretched?
And who is the fiddler that holds us in his hand?
Oh, sweet song!
She Moved Through The Fair
My young love said to me,
"My mother won't mind
And my father won't slight you for your lack of kind"
And she stepped away from me and this she did say:
It will not be long, love, till our wedding day"
As she stepped away from me and she moved through the fair
And fondly I watched her move here and move there
And then she turned homeward with one star awake
Like the swan in the evening moves over the lake
The people were saying, no two e'er were wed
But one had a sorrow that never was said
And I smiled as she passed with her goods and her gear,
And that was the last that I saw of my dear.
Last night she came to me, my dead love came in
So softly she came that her feet made no din
As she laid her hand on me and this she did say
"It will not be long, love, 'til our wedding day"
Suite Celta
[Instrumental]
Canción De La Muerte Pequeña/Song of the Little Death
"This dramatic poem with its aneiric belongs to the series of poems entitled 'Tierra y Luna' (Earth and Moon). In creating this song I have composed a Lament which ends in an Andalusian Saeta, the voice singing alone with the percussions signalling our ultimate destiny."
Prado mortal de lunas
Y sangre bajo tierra.
Prado de sangre vieja.
Luz de ayer y mañana.
Cielo mortal de hierba.
Luz y noche de arena.
Me encontré con la muerte.
Prado mortal de tierra.
Una muerte pequeña.
El perro en el tejado.
Sola mi mano izquierda
Atravesaba montes sin fin
De flores secas.
Catedral de ceniza.
Luz y noche de arena.
Una muerte pequeña.
Una muerte y yo un hombre.
Un hombre solo, y ella
Una muerte pequeña.
Prado mortal de luna.
La nieve gime y tiembla
Por detrás de la puerta.
Un hombre, ¿y qué? Lo dicho.
Un hombre solo y ella.
Prado, amor, luz y arena.
Mortal field of moons
and blood beneath the earth
Field of ancient blood
Light of yesterday and tomorrow.
Mortal sky of grass
Light and night of sand
I met with death
Mortal field of earth
A little death.
The dog on the rooftop.
Alone, my left hand
moved over endless mounds
of dry flowers.
Cathedral of ashes
Light and right of sand.
A little death
A death and I, a man.
A man alone, and she,
a little death
Mortal field of moons
The snow moans and trembles
at the door.
A man, what else? It's as I said
A man alone, with her
Field, love, light and sand
Aurora
"This instrumental theme is a hymn to Aurora, the dawn which greets us every morning and brings us new hope. Its light heralds a gentle awakening and, in the sound of the harp, we can sense the fragile drops of dew evaporating under the increasingly intense rays of sunlight."
[Instrumental]
Si Tornes/If You Return
"The poet Miquel Martí i Pol made a great impression on me when I was a teenager; his every word is suffused with the desire to live and enjoy each moment, making his poetry an eternal hymn to love."
Repetiré el teu nom i el meu també
Me'ls diré en veu molt baixa, com un prec
O, tal volta, un conjur
De sobte et sento
Molt a prop i el temor m'immobilitza
¿Ets dins meu?
¿Et perdré, potser, si em moc, et perdré?
Em tanca els ulls un calfred i et contemplo
Com a través dels vidres enllorats
D'una finestra
Pren-me tot, si tornes
I will repeat your name together with my own.
I will say them very softly, as if in prayer,
or, perhaps, an incantation.
Suddenly I feel you
very close and freeze with fear.
Are you inside me?
Will I lose you if I move?
My eyes close in a shiver and I see you
as if through the misted glass
of a window-pane.
Take all of me, if you return
Harpa E Delirio D’Água/Harp and Delirium of Water
"There has always been a dose association between the harp and water, the sound of the harp evoking rivers, waterfalls, seas, raindrops....The melancholy of this Portuguese poem gives rise to an intimate song which is gently rocked by waves of emotion."
Sal
Mó da Alma
-esta montanha
Do destino Alturas
Cascata
Harpa e delírio d'água
Um romeiro sequestrado
Dealba...
Salt
Whetstone of the Soul
-that mountain
Of fate Heights
Cascade
Harp and delirium of water
Purifying
A pilgrim held to ransom
Anima Nostra
Anima nostra,
sicut passer,
erepta est de laqueo
venantium:
laqueus contritus est,
et nos liberati sumus.
Our soul
is like a sparrow
that has escaped
from the fowler's snare;
the snare is broken
and we are free.
Peiwoh
[Instrumental]
Adoucit La Mélodie
On prétend que les anges qui charment nos oreilles
Viennent des planètes en giration.
Mais c'est pourtant leur foi qui mélange les espaces du Monde,
Adoucit leur mélodie.
Quand la vie a commencé à l'aube du monde
On entendait chanter les anges, nos coeurs témoignent.
Même pas morne et triste se souvient de l'écho qui vient des cieux
La musique est l'élan de ceux qui rêvent
Elle élève l'âme jusqu'au royaume des cieux
Les cendres rejoignent le feu latent reprend
Nous écoutant les hommes nourris de joie et de paix.
Adoucit la mélodie.
’Tis said, the pipe and lute that charm our ears
Derive their melody from rolling spheres *;
But Faith, o’erpassing speculation’s bound,
Can see what sweetens every jangled sound **.
We, who are parts of Adam, heard with him
The song of angels and of seraphim.
Our memory, though dull and sad, retains
Some echo still of those unearthly strains.
Oh, music is the meat of all who love,
Music uplifts the soul to realms above.
The ashes glow, the latent fires increase:
We listen and are fed with joy and peace.
Naonunai
[Lyrics not released...]
La Musica Callada
[Lyrics not released...]
Corazón: Muere O Canta
Está tan puro ya mi corazón,
que lo mismo es que muera o que cante.
Puede llenar el libro de la vida,
o el libro de la muerte,
los dos en blanco para él,
que piensa y sueña.
Igual eternidad hallará en ambos.
Corazón, da lo mismo: muere o canta.
My heart is now so pure
That it matters not if it dies or sings.
It can fill the book of life
Or the book of death.
Both are blank for my heart
That thinks and dreams.
It will find equal eternity in both.
Heart, it matters not: die or sing.
Anima Nostra A 2
[Lyrics not released...]
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