Cândido Lima interview (2018) - Revision history

Diogooutra at 15:51, 11 February 2020

2020-02-11T15:51:45Z

Diogo at 18:29, 9 April 2019

2019-04-09T18:29:52Z

Diogo at 14:58, 6 March 2019

2019-03-06T14:58:27Z

Diogo at 14:56, 6 March 2019

2019-03-06T14:56:45Z

Diogo at 14:51, 6 March 2019

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Diogo at 14:46, 6 March 2019

2019-03-06T14:46:35Z

Diogo at 14:42, 6 March 2019

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Diogo at 14:27, 6 March 2019

2019-03-06T14:27:46Z

Diogo at 14:14, 6 March 2019

2019-03-06T14:14:25Z

Diogo: Created page with "'''What was the compositional process for “Oceanos” like? Where did the idea for that piece come from, and how did audiences react when it was first presented live?'''..."

2019-03-06T14:12:51Z

Created page with "'''What was the compositional process for “Oceanos” like? Where did the idea for that piece come from, and how did audiences react when it was first presented live?'''..."

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 It was under these circumstances that I (already nearing the end of my time in Paris, which was between 75 and 78) undertook that project, at least in its digital component. As for the electronic component, I had already been able to explore it in previous years at the studio of the University of Vincennes, where I conducted a few electroacoustic music experiments.
-In 78, at the end of the summer, I was able to use the UPIC system created by the composer Iannis Xenakis for the first time at the CEMAMu research center (currently CCMIX). There, for a few weeks, I was able to synthesize sound through a very specific process that they then called the ‘conversational process’, which allowed for a direct dialogue between the user and the computer, or in other words, it wasn’t necessary to know how to program the computer in depth, but simply to use the studio’s peripherals. And that’s how the piece was created, through the use of specific electronic material created through the synthesizers at Vincennes’ and CEMAMu’s electronic studios.
+In 78, at the end of the summer, I was able to use the UPIC system created by the composer [[Iannis Xenakis]] for the first time at the CEMAMu research center (currently CCMIX). There, for a few weeks, I was able to synthesize sound through a very specific process that they then called the ‘conversational process’, which allowed for a direct dialogue between the user and the computer, or in other words, it wasn’t necessary to know how to program the computer in depth, but simply to use the studio’s peripherals. And that’s how the piece was created, through the use of specific electronic material created through the synthesizers at Vincennes’ and CEMAMu’s electronic studios.
 Other very important stages in the creation of that work are also worth mentioning, particularly the mixing stage, which occurred in the studios of the national radio broadcaster with the (very generous) collaboration of the radio’s technicians, who were infinitely patient in putting up with me as a composer and as a musician with a computer, as these realities were completely beyond their usual line of work. Although this also served to motivate them, and they would often spend hours with me in the studio at night, from nine to eleven, or even midnight….These technicians and friends were crucial in the completion of this and other pieces through their work and the time they allowed me to spend at the studio.

← Older revision		Revision as of 18:29, 9 April 2019
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	But I still follow my own path, with my own philosophical tranquillity, let’s call it that. When I compose a piece all I care about is finishing it. I think to myself that if I’ve heard it, then it doesn’t matter if anyone else wants to hear it or not. I can absolutely say that I write for myself. If you ask me if I don’t enjoy listening to my pieces played by others I would answer that I do, definitely, because one thing is to have it on the inside and another is to hear it in real life, and sometimes you discover new things that were hidden when listening to it in your mind, which is priceless. But I don’t force it to materialise in the external reality – a reality which for many years didn’t allow my ideas to pass through. It was never a problem. I don’t know if this is due to my nature or that of society. However, I don’t care about that. I never forced anything.		But I still follow my own path, with my own philosophical tranquillity, let’s call it that. When I compose a piece all I care about is finishing it. I think to myself that if I’ve heard it, then it doesn’t matter if anyone else wants to hear it or not. I can absolutely say that I write for myself. If you ask me if I don’t enjoy listening to my pieces played by others I would answer that I do, definitely, because one thing is to have it on the inside and another is to hear it in real life, and sometimes you discover new things that were hidden when listening to it in your mind, which is priceless. But I don’t force it to materialise in the external reality – a reality which for many years didn’t allow my ideas to pass through. It was never a problem. I don’t know if this is due to my nature or that of society. However, I don’t care about that. I never forced anything.

−	[[Category: Portuguese ~~Contributions~~]] [[Category: Interviews]]	+	[[Category: Portuguese Content]] [[Category: Interviews]]

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:58, 6 March 2019
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	But I still follow my own path, with my own philosophical tranquillity, let’s call it that. When I compose a piece all I care about is finishing it. I think to myself that if I’ve heard it, then it doesn’t matter if anyone else wants to hear it or not. I can absolutely say that I write for myself. If you ask me if I don’t enjoy listening to my pieces played by others I would answer that I do, definitely, because one thing is to have it on the inside and another is to hear it in real life, and sometimes you discover new things that were hidden when listening to it in your mind, which is priceless. But I don’t force it to materialise in the external reality – a reality which for many years didn’t allow my ideas to pass through. It was never a problem. I don’t know if this is due to my nature or that of society. However, I don’t care about that. I never forced anything.		But I still follow my own path, with my own philosophical tranquillity, let’s call it that. When I compose a piece all I care about is finishing it. I think to myself that if I’ve heard it, then it doesn’t matter if anyone else wants to hear it or not. I can absolutely say that I write for myself. If you ask me if I don’t enjoy listening to my pieces played by others I would answer that I do, definitely, because one thing is to have it on the inside and another is to hear it in real life, and sometimes you discover new things that were hidden when listening to it in your mind, which is priceless. But I don’t force it to materialise in the external reality – a reality which for many years didn’t allow my ideas to pass through. It was never a problem. I don’t know if this is due to my nature or that of society. However, I don’t care about that. I never forced anything.
		+
		+	[[Category: Portuguese Contributions]] [[Category: Interviews]]

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 What happened afterwards was fantastic, despite all the problems that also occurred there some amazingly transformative events…there’s no time or space now to describe all the good things that happened in music, but also in institutions and the minds of the people, etc. Obviously there’s still a current of conservatism, but parallel to that many great new things emerged, and on a personal level I have to say we don’t have much to complain about these days – merely being here and talking to you, having this kind of concerts… that’s something you could only do underground, hiding from the authorities before the revolution, because if you didn’t you were taking great risks. I never stopped thinking or doing what I wanted, but I remember perfectly that when I was the director of the Conservatory in Braga the previous director told me one day that “some people say you’re a socialist”…and to be called a socialist back then was the same as being called a communist.
-[[File:Rivoli-IMG 2753.jpg|thumb|Cândido Lima at the Rivoli, 2016]]
+[[File:Cândido-Rivoli.jpg|thumb|Cândido Lima at the Rivoli, 2016]]
 I thought it was funny, because as a director I tried to broaden the institution’s horizons, to bring audiences of different genres, natures and even regions together, taking schools to Lisbon to contemporary music meetings, but all of this was seen in the wrong light before the 25th of April. The students at Coimbra also wanted to put a label on me (they had to, they were part of the system) upon our first meeting: “We heard you were this and that, a communist, socialist, anarchist” and I would answer: “No, I’m not with any party, I like to pummel everyone”. And this was in 73, so you can understand what that life was like. I was completely beyond that, I was invited as a musician and not as a politician, and my answers were always like that. In Paris, when I was at the University, a few enthusiastic Arabs and Africans would ask me about the revolution, and if I was a communist, and I’d always say I was above such labels. I was even invited to a television show once, where they talked about the revolution, and a journalist asked me: “Was the revolution on the left or on the right?” and I answered: “Inside!” They stopped there and went to a commercial break… (laughs)

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:51, 6 March 2019
Line 90:		Line 90:
	What happened afterwards was fantastic, despite all the problems that also occurred there some amazingly transformative events…there’s no time or space now to describe all the good things that happened in music, but also in institutions and the minds of the people, etc. Obviously there’s still a current of conservatism, but parallel to that many great new things emerged, and on a personal level I have to say we don’t have much to complain about these days – merely being here and talking to you, having this kind of concerts… that’s something you could only do underground, hiding from the authorities before the revolution, because if you didn’t you were taking great risks. I never stopped thinking or doing what I wanted, but I remember perfectly that when I was the director of the Conservatory in Braga the previous director told me one day that “some people say you’re a socialist”…and to be called a socialist back then was the same as being called a communist.		What happened afterwards was fantastic, despite all the problems that also occurred there some amazingly transformative events…there’s no time or space now to describe all the good things that happened in music, but also in institutions and the minds of the people, etc. Obviously there’s still a current of conservatism, but parallel to that many great new things emerged, and on a personal level I have to say we don’t have much to complain about these days – merely being here and talking to you, having this kind of concerts… that’s something you could only do underground, hiding from the authorities before the revolution, because if you didn’t you were taking great risks. I never stopped thinking or doing what I wanted, but I remember perfectly that when I was the director of the Conservatory in Braga the previous director told me one day that “some people say you’re a socialist”…and to be called a socialist back then was the same as being called a communist.

		+	[[File:Rivoli-IMG 2753.jpg\|thumb\|Cândido Lima at the Rivoli, 2016]]
	I thought it was funny, because as a director I tried to broaden the institution’s horizons, to bring audiences of different genres, natures and even regions together, taking schools to Lisbon to contemporary music meetings, but all of this was seen in the wrong light before the 25th of April. The students at Coimbra also wanted to put a label on me (they had to, they were part of the system) upon our first meeting: “We heard you were this and that, a communist, socialist, anarchist” and I would answer: “No, I’m not with any party, I like to pummel everyone”. And this was in 73, so you can understand what that life was like. I was completely beyond that, I was invited as a musician and not as a politician, and my answers were always like that. In Paris, when I was at the University, a few enthusiastic Arabs and Africans would ask me about the revolution, and if I was a communist, and I’d always say I was above such labels. I was even invited to a television show once, where they talked about the revolution, and a journalist asked me: “Was the revolution on the left or on the right?” and I answered: “Inside!” They stopped there and went to a commercial break… (laughs)		I thought it was funny, because as a director I tried to broaden the institution’s horizons, to bring audiences of different genres, natures and even regions together, taking schools to Lisbon to contemporary music meetings, but all of this was seen in the wrong light before the 25th of April. The students at Coimbra also wanted to put a label on me (they had to, they were part of the system) upon our first meeting: “We heard you were this and that, a communist, socialist, anarchist” and I would answer: “No, I’m not with any party, I like to pummel everyone”. And this was in 73, so you can understand what that life was like. I was completely beyond that, I was invited as a musician and not as a politician, and my answers were always like that. In Paris, when I was at the University, a few enthusiastic Arabs and Africans would ask me about the revolution, and if I was a communist, and I’d always say I was above such labels. I was even invited to a television show once, where they talked about the revolution, and a journalist asked me: “Was the revolution on the left or on the right?” and I answered: “Inside!” They stopped there and went to a commercial break… (laughs)

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 '''What drove you towards composing and which were your first experiences in the field? Who influenced you in the process?'''
-[[File:Barcelona-IMG 2932.jpg|thumb|Cândido Lima in Barcelona, 2017]]
+[[File:Barcelona.jpg|thumb|Cândido Lima in Barcelona, 2017]]
 What I can tell you is that being part of a family of popular musicians, people who played music at the village level, ''fadistas'', guitar and mandolin players, music was in my DNA, and it was part of my life from early on. Throughout my childhood and as a teenager I studied basic music theory and I soon discovered my tendency towards composition. I was an organist in Braga from early on, and I even ordered a book on composition from the Musical Library of Porto to my village during the school holidays. They sent me a book that was absolutely impossible to understand for a 16 year old teenager (though I now keep it as sort of a relic in my personal library) – a harmony book by Tomás Borba, a great teacher who was in the national conservatory at the time, and I thus started trying to understand composition. No one ever told me to compose liturgical music though, which was the music people would compose in that day and age, in the villages and churches in Braga and throughout Portugal – I wanted to compose music beyond that tradition.

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 ''The following is an interview with Portuguese avant-garde composer [[Cândido Lima]], conducted by the Unearthing the Music team prior to his performance at OUT.FEST 2018.''
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 '''What drove you towards composing and which were your first experiences in the field? Who influenced you in the process?'''
 What I can tell you is that being part of a family of popular musicians, people who played music at the village level, ''fadistas'', guitar and mandolin players, music was in my DNA, and it was part of my life from early on. Throughout my childhood and as a teenager I studied basic music theory and I soon discovered my tendency towards composition. I was an organist in Braga from early on, and I even ordered a book on composition from the Musical Library of Porto to my village during the school holidays. They sent me a book that was absolutely impossible to understand for a 16 year old teenager (though I now keep it as sort of a relic in my personal library) – a harmony book by Tomás Borba, a great teacher who was in the national conservatory at the time, and I thus started trying to understand composition. No one ever told me to compose liturgical music though, which was the music people would compose in that day and age, in the villages and churches in Braga and throughout Portugal – I wanted to compose music beyond that tradition.
-So gradually, in a self-taught manner, I started learning from historical or technical books, books on harmony (the functional classical harmony) and such. Even from early on, as an organist, I had contacts with the repertoires of authors in European cathedrals that composed in a more modern (though not yet contemporary) music style, music along the lines of Debussy, Ravel, etc, and without noticing it these influences made their way inside my brain little by little. Slowly I started creating my own path, at first by writing my own little throwaway pieces (particularly when I entered the Conservatory) and by learning and practicing my built up my knowledge in a logical way, from the classics to the more modern and contemporary music. If you ask me how I made it to contemporary music, however, I’ll answer that I have no idea! Because every context I lived in, not only as a student but in my family as well, was always contrary to it. But I followed a certain order in a natural way through creating and discovering, and that’s how I found my path as a composer.
+So gradually, in a self-taught manner, I started learning from historical or technical books, books on harmony (the functional classical harmony) and such. Even from early on, as an organist, I had contacts with the repertoires of authors in European cathedrals that composed in a more modern (though not yet contemporary) music style, music along the lines of Debussy, Ravel, etc, and without noticing it these influences made their way inside my brain little by little. Slowly I started creating my own path, at first by writing my own little throwaway pieces (particularly when I entered the Conservatory) and by learning and practising my built up my knowledge in a logical way, from the classics to the more modern and contemporary music. If you ask me how I made it to contemporary music, however, I’ll answer that I have no idea! Because every context I lived in, not only as a student but in my family as well, was always contrary to it. But I followed a certain order in a natural way through creating and discovering, and that’s how I found my path as a composer.
 I could end here to keep this answer relatively small – I am naturally a musician, and naturally (but perhaps less so) I am a composer, though nothing in my family could indicate that I would have the urge to create. I had that perception very early on, when I was 16 or 17 or even before, so I went by myself (and that’s an important aspect) finding my own path, looking for accomplices and teachers, always not perfectly knowing what was going on. When people talk to me about my career…well, I have to say I don’t have one, I have a personal path that diverges from the codes and patterns that usually define the life of an artist.
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 At the time I lived in Lisbon and I had a piano that was loaned to me by the Gulbenkian Foundation, which was at the house of my very good friend Fernando Serafim, who hosted me when I went to Lisbon from Braga. I asked the Foundation if I was allowed to take the piano to Guinea, and even though they were very sympathetic (as they always were – I have an enormous debt to the Gulbenkian Foundation, particularly the people responsible for the Music Service), they told me the piano would have to be prepared for the weather conditions there, or “tropicalised”, so they couldn’t lend it to me. However, there was a piano at my house in the village that had been bought from neighbours of mine when I was young, and I told my father that if there was no piano in Guinea that I would send him a telegram saying “Send Piano” - and that’s what happened. That piano helped me continue my path as a pianist and composer.
 In Guinea-Bissau I did in fact write some music – by my own volition – in anonymity. For instance, I wrote a piece that was premiered in 1968 when I returned to Portugal, for violin, voice and piano, with a poem by Fernando Pessoa (“Impressões do Crepúsculo”). I also created some of what I think is some of my most important music: a series of songs for the youths there, many of which were recorded by young people at the school in Bolama, where I would teach choral singing in the morning, before service hours. One day I needed some new music to teach there and I didn’t have any. I saw an African soldier with a book – my old third grade book – which I asked to loan, and I took the poetry there to create those songs for the youth. I had already composed three of them before going to Africa, but the rest were written there. I took the book and I wrote the melodies in two days, then months later, after the summer holidays, I wrote the piano part in 8 days in blueprint paper. Afterwards I would have to go to the Engineering headquarters in Bissau to make copies for the students.
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 '''You lived as a musician and composer before and after the revolution. How would you characterise the musical milieu in Portugal during the dictatorship? How did you feel it change after it ended?'''
 There was a ‘status quo’ in the political system in general, which went hand in hand with the education system – even if there were forces here and there that wanted to change that ‘status quo’ the fact is that there were not (from a structural point of view) any major changes. Those who were beyond the system survived in various ways: either by isolating and separating themselves from the country within it, or by looking abroad for what the country wouldn’t give them. As a composer I often had to simulate ideas for a lack of available technology. It’s interesting that one time I presented one such experiment, for my piece “Projecções”, at a listening session with several international composers in Darmstadt and the following day I was asked where there was electronic music in Portugal. And I would answer: “There isn’t any electronic music in Portugal”. “What did you show us yesterday, then?” they would ask. It wasn’t electronic music, it was harmonium music simulating electronic music. “If you don’t have a dog, you hunt with a cat”, isn’t that what the people say? Even without the right instruments, if I have an idea of a certain direction for a composition, I know I can realise it with the meagre means I have available (like in ‘Poor Theatre’ in the theatre world).

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 Other very important stages in the creation of that work are also worth mentioning, particularly the mixing stage, which occurred in the studios of the national radio broadcaster with the (very generous) collaboration of the radio’s technicians, who were infinitely patient in putting up with me as a composer and as a musician with a computer, as these realities were completely beyond their usual line of work. Although this also served to motivate them, and they would often spend hours with me in the studio at night, from nine to eleven, or even midnight….These technicians and friends were crucial in the completion of this and other pieces through their work and the time they allowed me to spend at the studio.
 In between mixing stages, I would return to Paris to gather more electronic material. Eventually I reached the final mix, and that made me feel like the pilot of a spaceship. Being able to achieve this mixture of completely different sound sources generated vastly distinct dimensions in the composition itself: One defined by a mathematical, acoustic and psychological continuum of sound sliding without any major conflicts, and that of a pulse generated by a computer system which, being in its early stages of development, didn’t allow for much more than that. The electronic component was the rhythmic pulse, so to speak, of a piece where one could almost say there is no rhythm – but there’s a sonic explosion, a kind of Big Bang, which processes itself in the waves that come and go between this continuum and the electronic fragmentation. This is the gist of it – it’s a piece that comes from a different world, not only in the point of view of the philosophy of the systems’ creators, but also due to the nature of the sound sources themselves.
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 As for “A-mèr-es”, I have to say that it was triggered by Xenakis’ intervention at the Théâtre de la Ville in Paris, when he spoke to the people in charge of the Gulbenkian Foundation who had gone there to see the premiere of “Phlegra” (one of his most extraordinary pieces), suggesting that they should “commission a piece from Cândido” (“Il faut commander une oeuvre à Candidô!”, it was exactly what he said), which immediately led Dr. Pereira Leal to turn to me and say “We’re going to commission a piece from you”. “A-mèr-es” is one of the works I consider amongst my most important, in many ways more so than “Oceanos”, a more abstract, less immersive, and less emotional piece from the point of view of the audience. It was premiered in November 79 by the Gulbenkian Orchestra and Michel Tabachnik, a great maestro. There’s an important note I should mention about the concert: Two spectators wished for my death during the break! One said: “You should be killed.” And the other: “You should die!” I don’t know if they were twin brothers, but that’s what I heard. I was both jeered and applauded – the audience was split.
 There was, however, an exceptionally complimentary review by Dr. João de Freitas Branco, in “Diário Popular” that I only heard about years later when a friend told me about it. He was quite excited about the piece and also addressed the audience, writing that 30 years before they would have attacked Mahler as well. In fact, the concert also featured music by Mahler and Shubert, so it was only natural that an audience that was there to hear music by those composers would have felt insulted by a piece that is a true avalanche - not only the electronics but the orchestral part as well. As for me, I took in all of audience’s comments serenely, “candidly” as I usually say in jest. A maestro friend of mine, Pedro Amaral, often tells me envies me for having had someone wish that I would die!

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:14, 6 March 2019
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		+	''The following is an interview with Portuguese avant-garde composer [[Cândido Lima]], conducted by the Unearthing the Music team prior to his performance at OUT.FEST 2018.''
		+
	'''What was the compositional process for “Oceanos” like? Where did the idea for that piece come from, and how did audiences react when it was first presented live?'''		'''What was the compositional process for “Oceanos” like? Where did the idea for that piece come from, and how did audiences react when it was first presented live?'''