• Velada 1949 was commissioned by Quince Ensemble for premiere 23 April 2023, Coffey Street Studio, Brooklyn, NY

• Instrumentation: four treble voices

• Duration: 15'

• Text, fragments: La Prensa, Rubén Darío, Gilda Alemán Lyons

PROGRAM NOTE

Memory and breath are each inextricably linked to the creation of vocal sound. As vocalists, our muscles remember how to find the sounds in our arsenals; we physicalize resonance, and we remember—possibly even more than the sound itself—the way something feels in our bodies. The physical act of remembering is, in this way, a layered experience. I’d argue that that is true in many ways in a life.

In writing for the courageous vocalists of Quince, I have explored a deep family memory shared with me as a child; it’s so much a part of me that I haven’t—until now—gone deeper into the different ways that it has resonated over the course of a lifetime:

At the age of 4, my mother, Gilda Alemán—who was coached by my tía abuela Mana, Mariana García—learned and recited from memory in public performance the much-beloved poem “La Rosa Niña” by the revered Nicaraguan poet Rubén Darío. At well over 500 words, it’s dazzling to imagine her standing on a stage in front of a crowded Teatro González, spotlighted, with flashbulbs going off all around her, and reciting from memory pages of text. In writing this piece, I asked my mother to go deeper into this memory with me; even now, as a grandmother, she can still recite the entire poem without stumbling. It lives in her body, as a physical sensation. As memory.

There is a newspaper article from La Prensa—the Nicaraguan newspaper that covered the velada on which my mother performed—from which I drew text for this work; this text is interwoven with lines from Darío’s poem, and my mother’s own words, which I recorded in conversation with her.

There is a photo of my mother on stage that night, in her pretty dress and buckled shoes, standing in front of a microphone, completely focused on her performance. She is holding her hands out, slightly raised and to her side—a motion I find myself making sometimes as I sing. It is a snapshot of her, at 4 years old, remembering, and making memory. On the back of the photo it says: Velada 1949 —GL

TEXT

chiquitina de 4 años, recitó como una rosa niña

little one, four years old, recited like una rosa niña

Yo soy una niña 

que oyó a los vecinos pastores cantar

que hace al sol más sol, y la miel más miel

who heard the neighboring shepherds sing

who makes the sun more sun

who makes the honey more honey

Yo soy una niña 

La metamorfosis fue santa aquel día 

The metamorphosis was sacred that day

chiquitina de 4 años

La Prensa, 1949

Noches de Arte en Diriamba

Art Nights

con el mejor elemento artístico local

los dueños del arte nacional

una selecta velada

en el Teatro González

Noches de Arte en Diriamba

Art Nights

Y, en el cuarto número, algo sensacional

La enfocan en todos los colores

Spot lit in all colors

Los flachs la asustan

The flashes startled her

pero no la interrumpen

but they did not interrupt her

Cristal, oro y rosa

Alba en Palestina

flor de infancia

llena de una luz divina 
childhood flower

Cristal, gold and rose

full of divine light

flor de infancia

“You know as a child

I was nervous

I wanted to know the whole thing but

But now it’s totally different

You remember not just the poem but

but the way it happened

the way it felt

This is a memory

of being together

of home

together

It’s the realization that

the realization that you were loved”

y casi nos hace ver la estrella aparecer

and it almost makes us see the star appear

on the blue backdrop of the stage

en el fondo azul del escenario

chiquitina de 4 años

Text drawn from a December 1949 article in La Prensa, Rubén Darío’s “La Rosa Niña” and words by Gilda Alemán Lyons. Adapted by the composer.

composer-performed vocal mock-up