Sunday, December 11, 2011

Guanaguanare

Guanaguanare
Guanaguanare is an odd Christmas song, full of the pathos of longing if you listen to the exquisite sobriety of Jesus Avila, or fake merry Christmas spirit, but consoling, if you consider the Nancy Ramos version. And yet it is exquisitely atmospheric if you have had the luck to wake up more than once in Sucre where the morning calm is the calm I have never felt elsewhere.

I have to admit that this week end, as I am dusting off my Christmas music, it is hitting a raw nerve.  Thus work strange associations who make a single song suddenly embody all that is wrong with your surroundings.  Of course, it is a sad coincidence that this magic tune includes the name of the city Guanare where this week the most ugly aspects of misery came up as flotsam. But that flotsam was brought upon us by a regime that has really done nothing to protect children rights, gay rights, property rights, basic rights....  We certainly cannot blame the regime of the machismo, homophobia, disregard for the weak that are the sad heritage of our history.  But we can blame it from having paid lip service at best while it made it all the worse in its pursuit of power, and money, and materialism, which now reign supreme.

And to finish it all up last night the fascist thugs set aflame the "house that defeats the shadow" while today in yet another obscene cadena the tyrant of our spirit played with a little boy in military drag.

But Jesús Ávila leaves us a consolation:

Tenue es la luz y alegre la alborada

11 comments:

  1. CharlesC4:03 AM

    Wonderful.Great for spirit.Daniel, this kind of quality music is lost for so many today. Too bad they get no introduction to appreciate
    these great treasures.
    Thank you for this song. I will save it and share it.Cheers!
    Here's one from far away-a jewel I discovered years ago. Goa, India has lot of Portuguese historical influence and portuguese singers who play and sing some very historical style-can't find it in Brazil or even Portugal anymore...
    (Heard of Freddy Pinto?)
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9ndH_eV3aE&feature=related

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  2. Charles

    amazing how portuguese fado survives karnatic music :)

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  3. Boludo Tejano2:59 PM

    A soulful song. Mercedes Sosa recorded La Navidad de Luis.
    The entry of Chavista politics into Christmas in Venezuela has made the news with Chavez Nativity Scene.

    The article is a hoot.

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  4. I love the beauty of oriental aires...they take me back to my family's old home in El Pilar, Sucre.


    Their kinds of tunes-with voices scratching the sky, a bit off key and melancholic but pregnant with poetry and longing.I can just see in my mind's eye the graceful arms uplifting and maybe swollen in drunkenness..Soft golpes that summon up a caseria, a tiny tropical stream,love under the palms and guileless dreams... an allegorical swirling cauldron of Venezuelan prima materia of the soul..

    We can sense a hitch of sadness in those voices,but also respect and natural clarity...I always heard a dream fresh-and forever wanting, - but one that remained mysteriously present and forever alive in my heart.

    Thanks for posting...

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  5. CharlesC5:10 PM

    O/T This morning I saw this:
    http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/12/09/9330896-venezuelas-chavez-turns-up-in-nativity-scene

    Sick fiction.

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  6. Beautiful song, thanks!

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  7. Thanks for sharing that, Tejano. I like this: "Eighty percent of Venezuelans are with him." I guess if those Chavistas could ever wrest control of the CNE from those oppositionists, the new, fair elections which would surely follow would show these truthful results?

    I do wonder who's "briskly" buying those $9 coffee mugs.

    ReplyDelete
  8. AIO,Who buys them?

    Those who are buying the coffee mugs are in part people who are looking for re-sell.There is a huge market for collectibles online....in the future they will be worth something.

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  9. Boludo Tejano9:12 PM

    AIO, what struck me about the article was not what the Chavistas said. That is to be expected: standard boilerplate. What struck me was that the "journalist" added no information to put the Chavista comments into context, such as the ACTUAL record of President Chavez on infrastructure, not to mention other opinion polls.

    The journalist struck me as a pathetic ignoramus.

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  10. You know, I don't mind articles like that. Seems better than when they seek to inject some opinion and veer off into unsupported territory. (Think Roger Noriega, for example. Does this journalist do more harm?)

    I saw this as a puff piece, more focused on the emotions around the man than facts. Did you really expect substantive analysis when the hook is the nativity scene?

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  11. gustavo coronel10:27 PM

    The voice of Nancy ramos is like a cascade of crystal clear water. The tune is happy, yet nostalgic. I was on the way to forget how beautiful these voices sang and how beauiful these tunes.
    I was moved. Thanks, daniel,
    Gustavo

    ReplyDelete

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