Without a doubt, the Spanish medieval and renaissance harp had plenty of success in the colonies of Latin America. To this day, harp music--granted, with regional differences--remains an important part of the folklore of Mexico, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, and Venezuela (there, in the form of arpa central), as well as in Paraguay, where, as we shall see, it is so prominent that it becomes far more than merely a form of musical expression.
Alfredo Colman’s book is written with great clarity, sprinkled with many technical notes in beautiful Guaraní, the language of Paraguay’s native people. His in-situ knowledge and personal experience are essential because, in Latin America, information about music for the “lower income masses,” with the exception of ceremonial religious music, has always been rather scarce. This is due to a lack of interest by Paraguayan scholars, but foreign authors fortunately have stepped in to fill this gap. I can attest that the same process has occurred with reference to Venezuelan harp music. In addition to treating harp music in Paraguay, Colman highlights the spread of Paraguayan music beyond the boundaries of the nation, which he attributes to the poverty that has forced Paraguayan musicians to migrate.
This popular music, the instrument it features, and the techniques employed in playing it, have disappeared entirely from Spain but remain vital in Latin America. Paraguay’s sad and rocky history of unjustified wars promoted by its neighbors has eternally marked its music with a poignant nostalgia. Nonetheless, it’s a blessed country for ethnographic studies since the Paraguayan state preserves the ancestral Guaraní language, which exists in close relation with the Spanish language, generating criollo jopará, a creolized mixing of the two languages, as well as arts and crafts among a diverse population, with the harp music at the heart of national identity. But until the publication of this book, information on Paraguayan music and its musicians could only be obtained in sleeves and inserts found in cassettes and CDs.
Chapters 1 and 2 of The Paraguayan Harp orient the reader to the book’s content and introduce the terms arpa india and arpa paraguaya. A good label for this instrument, I think, would be arpa criolla, referring to an autochthonous harp native to a Hispano-American country. Arpa criolla paraguaya would refer to the harp played in Paraguay, alongside other American examples such as the arpa veracruzana, arpa llanera, and arpa peruana. The Guaraní word tekó (meaning approximately “homeland, place of fathers”) is pertinent here, used to describe aspects of an idealized Paraguayan identity, such as honesty and pride of country. The author’s ethnomusicological background comes to light as he discusses aspects of Paraguayan culture associated with the harp. First, he highlights the importance of the Jesuit reductions that began in 1607 in an attempt to “civilize” the Guaraní natives; he notes that string instruments were introduced by Jesuit priest Anton Sepp between 1691-1693, along with Spanish medieval and renaissance music, performed with a single-row diatonic harp. Chapter 3 addresses the history and politics of Paraguay, from the pre-colonial period, through the colonial period, to the modern period. It is interesting to note that the nation’s name derives from a Guaraní word meaning “water, or body crowned by water,” but nonetheless an ideology of mestizaje or racial mixing has prevailed.
Chapter 4, titled “Harp, Harpists and Luthiers,” documents in sixteen pages the evolution of the Paraguayan harp, associated with Félix Pérez Cardozo, performer and composer of classic pieces and innovator of the current fingering technique of Paraguayan harpists. His technique is marked by such elements as a tremolo with one and two fingers, the walking bass bordoneo technique, short glissandos with nail muffling, lightning fast arpeggios and octave passages, and the rasguido doble (double arpeggiated strum). These remarkable techniques have been studied by pedal harpists around the world, thanks to the tireless work of Alfredo Rolando Ortiz, harpist and promoter of the Paraguayan tradition. There is mention, as well, of the work of Epifanio López, a great innovator in the fabrication of the instrument, who is often mentioned in connection with Pérez Cardozo. Photographic evidence of the arperos of old show instruments similar to the ones found across all of Latin America, but the harp developed by López evinces innovative differences: the instrument achieves structural stability with a split neck and a pronounced curve, and exhibits bass strings with fishing nylon intertwined with nylon, thus achieving a power of sound projection that goes well beyond concert harps--besides offering an impressive example of woodworking, probably based in the native art of the Jesuit reductions.
Chapter 5 takes up the analysis of Paraguayan music, not in great depth due to the nature of the book, although it does present basic and general examples of Paraguayan music in its styles of polka-danza paraguaya, galopa, Guaranía-canción (Guaraní song) and valseado (waltzed), the latter always with features of syncopation and hemiola that are present in other Latin American harp traditions. Since 1930 the Paraguayan government has taken an interest in harp music and has sponsored projects to protect popular artistic expression. In 2010 a presidential decree named the harp as an icon of the national culture, and it named June 9, the day of Félix Pérez Cardozo’s passing, the unofficial World Harp Day. Accomplished harpist Mariano González, who took steps to liberate the harp from diatonic scales with the aggregation of a lever system and a thumb application, works with electronic harps and MIDI systems to promote the further development of the harp repertoire.
The appendix provides thirteen authorized biographies of the arperos of old and of the most important arpistas profesionales (professional harpists) in Paraguay’s current music scene. Tracing the use of the harp in Paraguay among the Guaraní people, in the Jesuit reductions, and into the contemporary moment of official recognition, Colman’s exposition is well supported by relevant evidence throughout, and this highly recommended book makes a strong case that the harp is deservedly one of Paraguay’s national emblems.
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[Review length: 994 words • Review posted on February 1, 2017]