Program notes : on my marimba etude & "Jemari Menari"

My etude for marimba solo, written for my dear friend, the great marimba player Miquel Bernat will be published this spring, and they asked me for a program note. And Genie Tjahjadi, an Indonesian-born mezzosoprano living in the US will sing "Bibirku Bersujud di Bibirmu" and "jemari Menari" in her recital next April. I have written about "Bibirku" so she can use that article here: http://andystarblogger.blogspot.com.es/2009_11_01_archive.html , so I just had to write about "Jemari Menari", so here they are : .......................................................................................................................................... The Birth of Drupadi is the first of my trilogy on the Javanese mythology fascinating female character, Drupadi. The second is for guitar solo, The 5 lovers of Drupadi and the third is The Humiliation of Drupadi for 2 pianos. I am thankful to Miquel Bernat for his inspiring insight on his instrument that has made it possible for me to write this piece. .......................................................................................................................................... Drupadi was born of wrath & revenge and was destined to bear grudges in her life. She was born of fire, from the sacred fire ceremony done by the king Putrakarma Drupada of Panchala kingdom as a revenge to his friend Druna who had humiliated him in front of his disciples. The pain and resentment had driven King Drupada to hold a sacred ceremony. Drupada begged the gods to be blessed with the perfect child to avenge Druna. Drupada's prayer was answered. From the holy fire out came two figures that the gods bestowed to him. A handsome male figure complete with mighty armor was given the name Drestadyumna who would later be given the responsibility of the killing of Druna. And the beautiful maiden female figure with dark skin color was Drupadi. For her whole life, the element of fire remained within her. .......................................................................................................................................... Jemari Menari is inspired by, and therefore dedicated to, my friend "Tris" as he likes to be called. I met him for the first time through his "klappertaart" (a type of cake) in a birthday party of a common friend of ours as his present, and it turned out that he is a fantastic pastry chef. But what is amazing are his fingers; those 10 fingers are the most beautiful fingers I've seen in my life: they are perfectly shaped, long, agile and nimble. Since I've enjoyed his gastronomic masterpieces since then, I thought of giving something in return. Far from being a masterpiece, my song is just a tiny remembrance to celebrate those dancing 10 fingers of his producing those delicious cakes. I was fortunate that one of my favorite poet, Nanang Suryadi, has a short poem about that theme that really fits with the music I had in mind that I could use.

Having 5 husbands ... and humiliated by other men

Now that I have to provide program notes to my "Drupadi" cycle, I'll continue with the third and last piece of my Drupadi trilogy. Last piece, right, but it was the first I wrote concerning this fascinating goddess. "The Humiliation of D" was written for the "Pianississimo" concert celebrating the New Year 2009. The idea is to feature multiple pianos and pianists, so my "Schumann's Psychosis" for 3 pianos-12 hands was also premiered there. The idea --and financial support for their commission-- came, naturally from the House of Piano in Jakarta that is also the sole representative of Steinway and Sons in Indonesia. And we are planning to do a similar (but with MORE pianos on stage!) event for the Jakarta New Year Concert 2011 with a new piece for multiple (we haven't decided how many) piano(ist)s.

"The Humiliation of D" was composed to be choreographed by Chendra Panatan. The story, taken from the Mahabharata epic originated from India but then adapted and became deeply rooted in the Javanese culture, goes around D's oldest husband Yudhistira who had lost everything during a gamble , and the only "thing" left to be gambled was his wife. And yes, you guessed it correctly : he lost this last game. So his enemy (who were in fact his cousins) took D and tried to strip her clothes off. But the gods took pity on her, and made the miracle that her clothes would be endless, even if it was pulled and pulled and pulled, and D turned around and around and around. A nice visual and aural idea, eh? A minimalistic idea with a maximalistic & spectacular effect !

5 husbands .... and no babies yet

This time this entry is for my friend, the fantastic guitarist Miguel Trapaga, by whom I have the honour and great pleasure to be commissioned my first piece for guitar solo. I have written for guitar in the past, but none for a solo instrument, and quite an elaborated and virtuosic one. This is only possible thanks to him, his support, his continuing efforts to give me a thorough insight of the instrument, its wondrous sound world, its delicacy and huge possibilities which I wasn’t aware of until then. I don’t think that a composer should be able to play every instrument, but in the case of the guitar, I thought I had to so I did learn its basic exercises by myself. Its finger positions, rich and strange colours should “fall into the fingers” as we say. And I must say, I have never worked together with an instrumentalist as intensively as I have with him, and boy, it's very inspiring and useful!

The result of our collaboration is my piece, “The 5 lovers of Drupadi”. It's in 4 movements. Eh?? It doesn’t add up, right? Well, it is based on a very small episode from the epic “Mahabharata” from India, where Drupadi was --by natural force (and a long story behind it) and not by sexual temptation!— married to the 5 brothers of Pandava. And 2 of them, Nakula and Sadeva were twins. Now, it’s quite a contradiction I must say, that Indonesian culture in general, and Javanese culture in particular could embrace this mythology quite naturally, since by historical background we are quite, let’s say, “right-winged”. Even until now. I mean, you can talk to any people there in Java and they’d tell you that homosexuality is a disease that could be cured, for example. There are even some extremists who would go as far as telling you that it is a sin to have a facebook account!

Back to my guitar piece, I ask for scordatura for the VI, V and IV strings. They are tuned to F, G and C respectively. So, I was very thankful to Miguel Trapaga that he would made a version of the score with what is played, not what sounds. The poor guy had to learn the piece as it sounds, not as it is written! If you can’t imagine what he went through, well, imagine that you are playing the piano and half of the keyboard produces different notes than what you usually play. Yes, half of it, since I re-tuned 3 strings of the guitar, which are half of the 6 strings of the instrument. I admit that my knowledge of the guitar is not advanced enough to be able to write the fingerings and the scordatura notation. And now that he has finished editing the score, my my, all those strange symbols and numbers could be misinterpreted as a secret message from the KGB!

Miguel Trapaga has given the world premiere of The 5 lovers of Drupadi on the 10th of March at Juan Bravo theatre in Segovia in a concert of the Philharmonic Society. He will tour it to Asia & New Zealand starting next June.