transart04

Muguel Azguime /Miso Ensemble in Itinerário do Sal

at the Schullian Greenhouse of Martina Schullian

You say that in the last years your way of writing music and poetry has become very similar, could you explain how you were able to make the two arts meet?

Since my early adolescence I was writing poetry at the same time I was studying and performing music. During those years I've published several poems in poetry magazines and two books of poems. Then publicly speaking my life became that of a musician and although I've continued to write poetry over the years, this was confined to a quiet unknown artistic activity Little by little as I was finding my personal way in composition I was also making new approaches to poetry writing but I took some time, in fact until the late ‘90s, to realize how close both ways were! What interests me are the transformations I can operate within the language itself, much more than semantic aspects, which is in fact the same kind of operation I'm doing with music, be it symbolically or concretely with the same sound. As such I was just a step away from a new form of integration of music and texts, and that was the step I've taken to compose the "text" and write the "music" that will be heard in "O Itinerário do Sal".

While reading your poems I was reminded of Baudelaire - but the reference might be personal, who has mainly inspired your poetry? And your music?

The strongest influence in my poetry writing when I was a teen-ager was first surrealism and somewhat later Stéphane Mallarmé. I don't currently find any particular influence in my writing, although as I use to say "we are made of all the contributions of our elder ones". As for music it's even less certain: during my apprenticeship I've studied and been influenced by so many different people as Stockhausen, Ligeti, Boulez, Cage and more recently people like Tristan Murail, and Emmanuel Nunes. The electroacoustic scene of the ‘40s and ‘50s (musique concrete and electronic music) also played an important role. Beside that, I've played several types of free jazz and free improvisations and names like Evan Parker, Derek Bailey, Cecil Taylor were also important models for me during a limited time period but very intense. Although "O Itinerário do Sal" is not a music piece, but much more of a sound poetry and theatre piece (I define it as Electroacoustic Theatre) my music alone uses most of the time acoustic models, mathematical models or physical models to build it's own structures and follows developments where the inner processes of transformation become the reason for the music itself with a strong "respect" to the perception aspects of the sound.

You dedicated over 12 years to your music education after University, and worked in the meantime. This shows an incredible dedication and a very strong personality, how were you able to collect enough energy to attain your aim?

This is probably a mystery that I'm unable to explain... besides those times I'm still doing a lot of activities, be them with my own creative work where I'm simultaneously composing and performing, or with music promotional activities I've been developing in more recent years which include the organization of the Musica Viva Festival, an independent record label, and a studio for research in electronic music, a composition competition, etc...

The Miso Ensemble was founded by you in 1985, would you like to introduce it?

The Miso Ensemble is mostly a duo (Paula Azguime, flute and myself, percussion) that already has a long and successful history. We have traveled almost to every continent and performed more than 400 times. It has been our personal experimental laboratory for both Paula Azguime and myself, and it has changed "shape" according to specific needs at a given moment or for a special project (we often play with other musicians or artists). At Transart in "O Itinerario do Sal" although I'll be alone on stage, Paula is taking care of the sound spacialization and of all the electronics to whom I communicate by using several interactive strategies. In fact this is more a duo than a solo, and without her skills this performance couldn't be possible.

It might be interesting if you added a couple of words on transart as event, something like,

- why did you accept to be perform at Transart?

Why shouldn't I have accepted? This is the type of festival I feel myself very much closed to. And the title says it all!

- what do you think of this multimedia festival directed by Peter Paul Kainrath?

I still don't know enough about it to make any serious judgment, but as I can see from the proposed program I find it extremely important and well designed as it responds to a much-needed approach to contemporary performing arts.

© Miguel Azguime

© Interview by Anny Ballardini

In the epicentre of the orb of silence, in the midst of such profound gaze the author is…

Miguel Azguime’s homepage:

http://www.misomusic.com/composers/azguime.html