My yearning for an edgier musical experience was satisfied on Thursday evening September 23 at the Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center. Over the past several years the Lincoln Center complex has been extensively remodeled and expanded. While retaining an association with what could be termed "high art," there has also been a strong effort to transform what was a beautiful but somewhat sterile and imposing architectural landscape into a more people friendly and inviting environment. Part of this effort has been to turn what was a rather nondescript "pass through" area adjacent to Lincoln Center into an inviting space that contains a centralized ticket center, a small cafe and an informal performance space.
It was in this space that I had the opportunity to experience Mexican vocal artist Juan Pablo Villa in collaboration with visual artist Arturo Lopez. The performance of the multimedia song cycle La Gruta de Baba (Which I think roughly translates as "the caverns of babble") was intriguing and mesmerizing on several levels. Villa performed with a bright light strongly projecting his silhouette onto a white screen behind him. Lopez improvised images onto the screen by manipulating material on a transparency projected with an overhead. The performance began with a distinctly (to me) Asian feel with throat singing and Zen-like drawing. Villa's vocal technique was both amazingly wide ranging and secure but always anchored in a beautiful tenor/falsetto voice that was pure and open. Much of the vocal part was non-texted vocalise. When there was text, it seemed to be more for sonority or rhythm than literal meaning. Only in the last song was the text and singing more straightforward. Villa also used digital sampling and recording to create loops, ostinati, vocal distortions and, most interestingly, contrapuntal and harmonic lines based on his singing. To the best of my knowledge, nothing was prerecorded. The visual improvisations were equally wide ranging, with abstract designs changing into more literal images that would themselves be transformed. The fluid rhythm of Lopez's strokes was a part of the performance as well.
In reading up on Villa I learned that he expanded his basic vocal training by studying the vocal techniques of such peoples as the Tuvans of Mongolia and the Inuit of Alaska and Canada in addition to many Mexican vocal techniques. In both his and Lopez's performances expressive goals were never unclear and nothing seemed gratuitous as can be the case with such performances. Just as George Crumb did with his song cycle, Ancient Voices of Children, Villa Lopez takes this genre to a new place.
This was an altogether remarkable event that will linger in my memory for long time.
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