For this series, we introduce the German-Peruvian artist Melanie Velarde who worked with some of our original field recordings taken during our expeditions into the Matsigenka community of Shipetiari.
The Matsigenka are an Amazonian indigenous people, who live between the departments of Cusco and Madre de Dios in the Manu National Reserve; one of the largest biospheres in the world. The Matsigenka have been able to maintain their culture and identity through the centuries, passing through the Conquest, the Republic, the armed conflict and their greatest struggle today, the development of hydrocarbon exploitation activities, deforestation and climate change.
Melanie Velarde gives us the opportunity to approach this community aurally, with compositions based on *sound recordings from their natural setting, fauna and activities, such as the song of Lola while "threading" cotton, songs of power for the preparation of snuff using tobacco leaves by Samuel, or Gregorio telling a story of the spider and the origin of cotton.
In Velarde's words, she composes through a "flow from the unconscious", thus complementing these recordings with dreamy melodies, hypnotic rhythms and multi-layered textures, opening for us a "window" into the soundscape of this community, in a dreamlike and meditative way of this millenary culture.
Curation by: Mariano León (Behuá Icára)
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*Field recordings were conducted by Xapiri Ground and originate from their expeditions into the Matsigenka community of Shipetiari, located in the Manu Biosphere Reserve, in the Peruvian Amazon.
released March 26, 2022
Mastering: Christian Mun