New Songs of Resistance
Files
Abstract
My culminating experience project, New Songs of Resistance, consists of four chamber- jazz arrangements of politically salient and historically significant songs from the nueva canción and related Latin American musical and social movements. The project also includes three original compositions of my own addressing contemporary issues. The final work consisted of these seven recordings, plus three solo piano interludes, scores, and a multimedia presentation. The presentation outlines the history of nueva canción, the principal artists whose work I studied, and samples of the scores and recorded works to illustrate compositional tools, orchestration choices, and performance techniques used therein. I selected the four nueva canción songs—“Gracias a la vida” (Violeta Parra), “Aquí me quedo” (Victor Jara), “Cinco siglos igual” (León Gieco), and “Apesar de voce” (Chico Buarque)—based on extensive listening and research, choosing pieces by songwriters who were historically significant, and whose music touched me most deeply. I also considered the songs’ contrasting musical elements in the context of an album as criteria for their selection. In addition, I highlight particular Latin American folk rhythms and styles, such as cueca, merengue venezolano, and chacarera, which I studied and practiced during the year in the context of learning and adapting this repertoire.
Publication Date
7-1-2018
Campus
Boston Campus
Recommended Citation
Yeager, Jason, "New Songs of Resistance" (2018). Global Jazz. 51.
https://remix.berklee.edu/graduate-studies-global-jazz/51
Comments
Project Components: paper (.pdf), presentation (.pdf), audio files (ZIP file containing 10 .wav files), scores (ZIP file containing 7 files).