Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Work Overview

¿Qué pasaría si la tierra pudiera hablar? or 'What If the Land Could Speak?' was especially commissioned by José Luis Urquieta (La Serena, Chile), and is dedicated to the Mapuche People (the indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and south-western Argentina), who as a collective indigenous group with a common social, religious, and economic structure represent "80% of the indigenous peoples in Chile, and about 9% of the total Chilean population."

A significant historical fact is that in spite of continued efforts by the first European settlers to subjugate the indigenous peoples in the New World, with their incredible resilience, the Mapuche resisted domination for over 300 years. In fact the Mapuche are the only South American indigenous group that until the 1883 'Pacification of Araucanía' remained unconquered by both the Spanish colonialists and the Inca Empire (the largest empire in pre-Columbian America). "The name 'Mapuche' is composed of two parts: 'Mapu', which means land; and 'che', which means people," and their language 'Mapudungun' is an Araucanian language related to 'Huilliche' (a moribund branch of the Araucanian language family spoken by about 2,000 ethnic Huilliche people in Chile). The UNPO (Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization) - an "international membership-based organization established to empower the voices of unrepresented and marginalized peoples worldwide and to protect their fundamental human rights" states that the "socio-cultural and political relations" of the Mapuche "have always been shaped and complemented by their spirituality, their religious beliefs and the strong relationship between man, land and nature."

In a chapter in Cultural Politics in Latin America (2000) entitled 'The Ins and Outs of Mapuche Culture in Chile' Sara McFall and Roberto Morales explain: "The Mapuche have a spiritual relationship with the land, through which they maintain a link with their ancestors and the spiritual world. They express the fact that the land has no commodity value for the Mapuche; to sell it would be like selling one's mother; to remove the Mapuche from their ancestral homes would be to rip an ancient tree from the ground and transplant it without its roots." ¿Qué pasaría si la tierra pudiera hablar? celebrates Mapuche culture, and its title has been utilized conceptually in direct reference to the Mapuche and their spiritual philosophy that connects man, land and nature.

Work Details

Year: 2020

Instrumentation: Oboe.

Duration: 7 min.

Difficulty: Advanced — Professional

Dedication note: Dedicado al Pueblo Mapuche (Dedicated to the Mapuche People)

Commission note: Commissioned by José Luis Urquieta.

First performance: 30 Oct 22. Gammel Rådhus, Nørresundby, Denmark

The composer notes the following styles, genres, influences, etc. associated with this work:
Mapuche People ; Stefan Hollos and J. Richard Hollos, Creating Rhythms (2014) ; Unrestricted Rhythms ; Synthetic Scale Formations ; Clockwise Rotations of ‘minor 2nd, major 2nd, major 3rd, major 2nd’ Intervallic Pattern ; Three-Octave Ascending and Descending Scales.