domingo, 15 de agosto de 2021

More than meets the eye

In 1974 I was going through a complicated and serious process of evaluating my role as a composer. Portugal was under a revolutionary process, everything seemed possible, all our inner and seemingly implausible dreams could suddenly become reality. But at the same time, overwhelmed by all these new possibilities, music, all music, seemed too much music. One late night, as I was walking through an empty field, on my way home, I was struck by the sound of thousands of insects, small cicadas, which to this day I haven't been able to identify properly. These insects produced short clicking sounds, similar to this..I guess it could be, who knows, Tettigettalna aneabi or Tymapnistalia Gastrica. It was, in any case, a magnificent "concert."

I stood there for a really long time, listening. And throughout that process the answers to my problems started to unravel. Instead of worrying about music and my role as a producer of (yet more) sounds I should stop to listen and pay more attention to the sounds around me. Some time later I picked up a copy of a journal I used to get regularly at that time, called Musique en Jeu. Issue #18, the one that came out after that moment of epiphany I described, included an intriguing article in its Chroniques section. It was titled La Musique de la Ville, and it reported on a project called The Vancouver Soundscape (2 discs, 33 tours, stéreo EPN 186, plus un livret 72 pages, Direction R. Murray Schafer, $1 CAN, hors commerce...) This document was produced by an organisation called World Soundscape Project. The article included an address, and instructions to obtain this disc. I immediately requested my copy, and less than two weeks later, I received my copy and some other materials, produced by the WSP, accompanied by a beautifully written letter from the director of the project himself, who took the time to answer to this totally unknown person from Portugal. He described the project, inquiring about the reasons for my interest in it and opening their resources to any endeavours I would be willing to pursue here. Later on I received copies of all the other WSP publications. Sometime later, UNESCO's Courier included more information about Schafer and his WSP.

This was also the time I acquired my first portable tape recorder, with which I recorded every sound I could hear. It was also a time of intense and serious study. Slowly realising the full consequences of the concept of acoustic ecology that Schafer presented in his writings and public appearances. A concept deeper than I ever thought. There was literally more to it than meets the eye.

In 1977, R. Murray Schafer came to Lisbon, Portugal, to give a seminar on sound and music education at the Gulbenkian Foundation. He had with him a copy of his then newly published The Tuning of the World. Remembering, no doubt, our previous contacts, he had kindly invited me to attend that seminar. It was a deeply intense experience. Parallel to our daily work we had long personal conversations on matters in which we were so passionately interested and  involved. Our discussions, the reading of his book and others he had written, complemented by my own progress and studies in this area, changed my life forever. I became who I am today because I was fortunate to meet Murray this way, and chose to follow his path.

We kept in close contact, we met regularly at the congresses and conferences organised around the world on acoustic ecology and related matters, I invited him to be the artistic director of  the historical Coimbra Vibra!, undoubtedly the most important event included in the program of the Coimbra, Capital Nacional da Cultura 2003 project. I was also responsible for his appearance at the 12th International Congress on Sound and Vibration in 2005 here in Lisbon, as a keynote speaker. He presented an unforgettable essay titled I Have Never Seen a Sound, that kept over 1000 acousticians, engineers and architects tied to each and every word, in absolute silence. These are historical milestones that I witnessed.

On this day,  similar thoughts are most assuredly crossing the minds of hundreds of other people with whom Murray established close relationships along the years. People who were also deeply influenced by him, who had also their lives radically changed, who are no doubt experiencing the same feelings today as I am now and will no doubt also miss him as much as I do.

One thing I can personally assure you all: I have never seen anyone like dear, dear Murray,


(photo by our mutual friend Marc Crunelle, at Koli, Finland, 2010)