τ ο τ ρ α γ ο ύ δ ι τ ω ν σ ε ι ρ ή ν ω ν (T h e S i r e n s S o n g)

- S e v e n G y m n o p é d i e s -

O t a c í l i o M e l g a ç o

[duration 42:19] all rights reserved

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The artist Otacílio Melgaço has two official curators in the virtual world. A curator (from Latin: ´curare´, meaning ´to take care´) is a manager or overseer. Traditionally, keeper of a cultural heritage institution (e.g., gallery, museum, library or, as the present case: sound archive) is a content specialist charged with an institution's collections and, highlighting the context in force here, involved with the interpretation of personal (heritage) material. Both, Mr. Paz and Mr. Campbell, are, therefore, reviewers of the Melgacian works. To learn more about their missions, tasks, assignments and responsibilities by means of valuable informations regarding the compositional process, the performative rhizomes and other special features, just click the following link: otaciliomelgaco.wixsite.com/preamblebypsp
(O.M.Team; P r e l u d e)

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"Along the stylistic history of the Composer, ´το τραγούδι των σειρήνων´ is - as the title ratifies - a creation abysmally steeped in Greek mythology. Evoke mermaids, their voices, songs (female spectra) ... as well as interprets the Odyssey - Ulysses, Homer et cetera (male spectra). There are all melgacian glossary covering East and West and also his peculiar way of sound mixing. Otacílio used a small choir and in sound engineering, he multiplied the voices at will.
The element that most caught my attention was the artfulness, the skill with which really translated mythology (his exciting and intriguing own mythology) in a musical form. What is contained in his ´Songs (and songs of the Sirens)´ can not be labeled; and boldly extrapolating:

1 - Sometimes I believe that his Sound does not sound...human! What do I mean? The creator escapes the stereotypes, the references, the predictability and points to a divergent direction. If contemporary music has become, mostly, or repetitive or unimaginative or hostage-ready formulas, O.M. indicates a real and noticeable evolutionary sense for sound universe (and aesthetic and, finally, artistic in full scope). He´s not a mere servant of contemporary cacophony, his concoctions already extrapolate these boundaries: he does Music and that's enough. ´Not human´ because are enigmatic the fountains where he goes to seek inspiration, maybe. Because, even today - that we've heard just about everything - or nearly, there are still new in melgacian musical pieces and even firsts! Because seemed almost impossible to suppose that we could still be surprised and ´abducted´ by compositional expressions (as calved by O.M.)! Yes, there is a certain mystery in his breeding, in his iconoclasm; independence; originality; ... even in his innermost personal life. He is a force of nature at the same time a walking incognito. In a silent way... Adverse to a world of celebrities and so fragmented in their growing vacuities; far from an artistic obsession for fame at any price; Otacílio Melgaço remains in a silent way... Probably for this reason:

2 - Listen to his compositions ... sounds like listening Music for the first time! Probably for this reason:

3 - After assimilate his phono-edifications, never listened to music as we heard before.

What else to say? Resuming the panorama of this review: with dissonance and consonance ´as two sides of the same coin´; occasional atonalities and minimalist passages; inventive exploration of stochasticity; propositions of harmonic landscapes very particular; O.M. inserts both electronic paraphernalia as concrete; open dialogues with several languages ​​and dialects stylistic - temporal and ´timeless´; using countless sound sources; completely averse to ephemera; antipode of fads or incestuous cultural factions; preferring to be on the sidelines rather than shackled to masturbators in cahoots on duty; ..., alongside Otacílio holding the helm of this taming ´navis´, we must throw ourselves to the seven seas, the seven ´ginopédias´... The melgacian Offspring are always a wonderful, challenging and irresistible Ὀδύσσεια´ and, thanks to him!, from now - all we can be called by ´Odysseus´!" (Caio Campbell; Anglo-Brazilian semiologist and musician)

"Two meanings were adopted by Melgaço:

I - already mentioned in Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Dictionnaire de Musique (Paris: Duchesne, 1775), where

G y m n o p é d i e

is described as ´Air ou Nome sur lequel dansoient à nu les jeunes Lacédémoniennes´ (vol 1, p. 376) [Ária ao som da qual dançavam nuas as moças lacedemônias(!)];

II - Greek origin and context, ´Chants accompanying gymnastic exercises.´ Melgaço certainly brings to light exercises but sensory, perceptual, emotional, intellectual (...) and even spiritual.

(Inevitably, his endless fascination for Erik Satie must have influenced.)

Here - We are transported to other worlds; i - whether on their mythological submersible mysteries and dangers and enchantments; ii - plurally are the Greeks in their ceremonies, festivities, dancing, nakedness, ..., warmongering.

Above all we launched an inescapable sonic sea that is unspeakable, unpronounceable ... because (apart from working with a small choir - members of his Ensemble - and then establish the extent necessary manipulating his sound engineering - still an active part of his compositional vein):

Mr. Melgaço
invented
the
languages ​
​sung
in
his
phonograph
album!

The only exception is a poem in ancient Greek.

So remember a song from Brazilian Dorival Caymmi - perhaps the most Greek of all the minstrels from the same country of Melgaço:

´It is sweet to die at sea In the green waves of the sea It is sweet to die at sea In the green waves of the sea.

The night that he didn't come back was… Was a sadness for me The sailboat returned alone It was a sad night for me.

The sailboat sailed at night did not return at dawn The mermaid of the sea took away the handsome sailor.

In the green waves of the sea, my dear, He went to drown himself
He made his groom’s bed in the lap of Iemanjá.´

Iemanjá is the goddess of the sea (through certain belief of african-Brazilian culture.) Now, hearing to the Melgacian voices, listening ´το τραγούδι των σειρήνων - 7 G i n o p é d i a s -´, we are all, in accordance to the review of Caio Campbell, oceanic ​​Gods! Metamorphosed Ulysses, most intrepid and devoured by myths. Therefore, (more) eternal. Force majeure, no more return to Ithaca! Could Penelope apologize? Not wear shrouds, palls. Ulysses will ´dress the deep Waters´, will ´coat your skin with the Songs of the Sirens´... If we all can be called - facing this seven times masterpiece - ´Ulysses´; Mr. Melgaço must urgently be nicknamed: ´Homer´. Homer sweet (and ephifanic) Homer." (Pablo S. Paz; Argentinean musicologist)

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I - The Gymnopédies, published in Paris starting in 1888, are three piano compositions written by French composer and pianist Erik Satie.

II - These short, atmospheric pieces are written in 3/4 time, with each sharing a common theme and structure. Collectively, the Gymnopédies are regarded as an important precursor to modern ambient music — gentle yet somewhat eccentric pieces which, when composed, defied the classical tradition. For instance, the first few bars of Gymnopédie No. 1 consist of an alternating progression of two major seventh chords, the first on the subdominant, G, and the second on the tonic, D. The melodies of the pieces use deliberate, but mild, dissonances against the harmony, producing a piquant, melancholy effect that matches the performance instructions, which are to play each piece "painfully", "sadly" or "gravely". From the second half of the 20th century on, the Gymnopédies were often erroneously described as part of Satie's body of furniture music, perhaps because of John Cage's interpretation of them.

III - The work was possibly based upon the poetry of J. P. Contamine de Latour (1867–1926), who wrote Les Antiques ("The Ancients"), a poem containing these lines:

Oblique et coupant l'ombre un torrent éclatant Ruisselait en flots d'or sur la dalle polie Où les atomes d'ambre au feu se miroitant Mêlaient leur sarabande à la gymnopédie Slanting and shadow-cutting a flickering eddy Trickled in gusts of gold on the shiny flagstone Where the atoms of amber in the fire mirroring themselves Mingled their sarabande with the gymnopaedia.
Satie claimed they were inspired by reading Gustave Flaubert's novel Salammbô. (Orledge, p. 207)

The exact connotation intended by Contamine in using the Greek word gymnopédie remains uncertain. Among the possibilities are:

dance – probably, as he mentions it alongside another dance, the saraband(e);

antiquity – supposedly, given the title of the poem. This however does not yet give a clear picture of how antiquity was perceived in late 19th-century France (see below);

nudity – maybe, although words like "gymnastique" (gymnastics) and "gymnase" (gymnasium) based on the same Greek word for nudity (γυμνός – "gymnos") were common in those days, but had lost any reference to nudity; in Sparta, when much of schoolwork was physical training, the youths were typically nude. It seems clear that -ped refers to children (paed). As suggested below, a dance or parade by children from the gymnasium seems a reasonable interpretation.

warfare (as in Ancient Greece the word indicated a war dance) – probably not; little war-like intent is apparent in the poem;

religious ceremony/festivity (which was the context of the Ancient gymnopaedia) – probably neither; there seems to be no allusion made to them in the poem.

Gymnopédie also appears as an infrequently used word in 19th century France, to the point it might have been perceived as a neologism by many. It was, however, already mentioned in Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Dictionnaire de Musique (Paris: Duchesne, 1775), where Gymnopédie is described as “Air ou Nome sur lequel dansoient à nu les jeunes Lacédémoniennes” (vol 1, p. 376).

All this might indicate that Satie and Contamine chose the word gymnopédie perhaps rather for its intangible exoticism, than for connotations of which they were probably hardly aware themselves.

IV - Satie apparently used the word "gymnopédiste" (gymnopaedist), before having written a note of his later famous gymnopédies.
The anecdote of Satie introducing himself as a "gymnopaedist" in December 1887 runs as follows: the first time Satie visited the Chat Noir cabaret, he was introduced to its director, Rodolphe Salis, famous for serving sharp comments. Being coerced to mention his profession, Satie, lacking any recognisable professional occupation, presented himself as a "gymnopaedist", supposedly in an attempt to outwit the director.

...for purposes of pragmatism and clear exegesis,
quotes have Wikipedia as a source...

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Between two parentheses...
(Atonalism, Twelve-Tone, Serialism, Musique Concrète... Acousmatic. Eletroacoustic. Magnetic Tape. Expressionism, New Objectivity, Hyperrealism, Abstractionism, Neoclassicism, Neobarbarism, Futurism, Mythic Method. Electronic...Computer Music, Spectral, Polystylism, Neoromanticism, Minimalism and Post-Minimalism...are addressed by Melgaço. Paradoxically New Simplicity and New Complexity also.
Art Rock, Free Jazz, Ethnic Dialects, Street Sounds are occasional syntax elements.
All the possibilities mentioned above and others that were not mentioned are the usual accoutrements of the composer/instrumentalist to establish his ´babelic´ glossary. We can prove this in a short passage of a single composition up along the entirety of a conceptual phonograph album. All distributed over a career and idiosyncratic records. Have we a universe before us and I propose to see it through a telescope, not a microscope.
I propose not handle very specialized topics here. Otherwise would be, with the exception of musicians and scholars, all hostages of a hermetic jargon. Because more important is to present Otacílio Melgaço to the general public and not to a segment of specialists. Faction of experts not need presentations, depart for the enjoyment beforehand. For this reason there is no niche here for intellectual onanism and encrypted musical terminology. The reason for these parentheses is to establish such elucidation. The non-adoption of technicalities leads to more panoramic, amplifier reviews. Are You always welcome. Those who do not dominate contemporary music and are introduced to the world of ubiquitous O.M. [autodidact and independent artist who, being more specific, does not belong to schools or doctrines; artist who makes Music and that´s enough; music devoid of labels or stylistic, chronological, historical paradigms or trends] and Those who belong to the métier and turn to enjoy propositions they know and also delving into advanced Melgacian sound cosmogonies...
I conclude poetically. ´Certeza/Certainty´ by Octavio Paz. ´Si es real la luz blanca De esta lámpara, real La mano que escribe, ¿son reales
Los ojos que miran lo escrito? De una palabra a la otra Lo que digo se desvanece. Yo sé que estoy vivo Entre dos paréntesis.´ If it is real the white light from this lamp, real the writing hand, are they real, the eyes looking at what I write? From one word to the other what I say vanishes. I know that I am alive between two parentheses.
We´re all more and more a-l-i-v-e now.)
- P.S.P.