As a classically trained musician, I’ve been taught and trained to comply with a specific set of pre-established rules and concepts. As cellist Tanja Orning puts it in her PhD thesis The Polyphonic Performer, “the training of a classical musician is designed to develop the ability to follow the intentions of the composer as expressed in the score”¹. From this quote we gather that this practice is text-based with a pre-designed hierarchy, where the composers set the rules to which performers are subservient. However, the reality of classical music practice is more complex than that. In her essay The Perfect Performance of Music and The Perfect Musical Performance music philosopher Lydia Goehr refers to the existence  distinct conceptions of performance practice, for instance the notion of a perfect performance of music and that of a perfect musical performance, which can at times coexist and compete in the same performance. While a perfect performance of music (PPM) is focused on the fidelity to a score, the essence of a work and the intentions of its composer, perfect musical performance (PMP) is focused on the musical experience of both the audience and the performers and on ideals of virtuosity and charismatic musicianship. Even though both conceptions may coexist, musical training, as Orning stresses, tends to emphasize a PPM approach.

Developed in the end of the 18^th century and established throughout the 19^th century, the notion of PPM points towards a Platonic ideal of the musical work as an independent abstract object with a fixed set of characteristics, an ideal image that the performance should faithfully match. In this conception, the ultimate figure of authority is the composer who, as pianist and musicologist Ian Pace describes in his essay Hierarchies in New Music: Composers, Performers, and ‘Works’, “creates a musical ‘work’; something which exists as an abstract ideal, independently of specific realizations in performance”. Linked to this perspective is also the concept of Werktreue, literally meaning “fidelity to the work”. As Orning points out, to be faithful to the work is to be faithful to the score and therefore to the composer’s intentions. 

On the second half of the 20^th century a new conception of musical performance practice is developed – the historically informed practice (HIP). This can be seen as an extension of the PPM conception, since its practitioners look forward to reconstructing the “original” version of a musical work. However, while PPM often focusses on the psychological understanding of the score and the composer, in a HIP-context the work becomes the objectification of a historical moment. Therefore, as musicologist Hermann Danuser explains, HIP is based on the literal and implicit accuracy of the score and takes into account the physical and sonic conditions in which the work was produced². To achieve this, a close collaboration with musicology ensues in order to reconstruct musical works from the past based on historical sources; in addition, original instruments are used and performances preferably take place in restored historical venues. 

Although baroque music used to be HIP's main focus, it soon expanded to other music periods including contemporary music. In the field of HIP applied to contemporary music it is worth mentioning the project HIPEX - Historical Performance Practices of Experimental Music - at the Orpheus Institute, led by musicians and researchers Luk Vaes, Seth Josel and Godfried-Willem Raes. HIPEX's goal is to reconstruct works from composers such as Mauricio Kagel and Helmut Lachenmann. The experimental approaches to composition, notation, performance and electronics from composers such as the aforementioned often result in pieces that are incorrectly documented, leaving doubts and gaps on how to perform them.

But a fidelity-based (or maybe fidelity-obsessed) conception of practice such as PPM or HIP can be limiting and even dogmatic since, quoting the philosopher and musicologist Peter Szendy, we become “paralyzed with authenticity”³. It pushes performers to a place of subservience to the work which leaves no space to convey their own feelings and personalities.

I started my practical work by trying to establish a historically informed performance of Constança Capdeville’s Avec Picasso, ce matin…. However, I was from the beginning suspicious towards the validity of this approach. My uncertainty laid on the arguments presented by the musicologist Nicholas Cook in his essay Between Process and Product: Music and/as Performance, for whom recovering an original version is an impossibility, which was confirmed in my work in practical terms by the archival problems, the gaps between information and the incongruence in sources of Avec Picasso, ce matin…. Very likely, not being able to develop a completely faithful reconstruction and performance of the piece could be a possible outcome of my work with the piece.

In reality, I now recognize that these apparent problems became for me the fuel for the development of subversive approaches to the score. As inspiration for the development of these approaches I took Cook's possibility of thinking about scores as “scripts” rather than “texts”. In the context of his essay Between Process and Product: Music and/as Performance, this distinction is developed as an argument towards understanding performance as generator of social meaning, that is, the score would be a pretext to a series of social actvities and encounters centred on the music. However, I took the meaning of the word “script” very literally. The score becomes, in the context of my work, what performance theorist Richard Schechner considers a proto performance. Proto performance is the starting point to a performance, what precedes and / or gives rise to it. I see the score not as an end in itself (as proclaimed by the PPM conception) but rather a pretext for the creation of different music projects⁴.

Approaches where the authority of the text is questioned have been developed in other art forms including performance art and theatre⁵. Richard Schechner poses as an example Shakespeare’s Hamlet, which has been used as the pretext for many other productions. Schechner goes even further as to state:

“Understood performatively, texts are transformable and pliable sign and/or symbol systems. Every text invites being remade into new texts.”⁶

But Avec Picasso, ce matin… is also an open work and as philosopher Umberto Eco puts it in his essay The Open Work, open works

“reject the definitive, concluded message and multiply the formal possibilities of the distribution of their elements”⁷ 

A piece written in this format asks for a certain degree of freedom and requires some effort by the performer to assemble it. Capdeville's ambiguous instructions in the score, partly due to the already mentioned poor documentation on the piece, offered me an opportunity to take this assembly a step further. It made me wonder whether I could explore the essence of the piece rather than just reconstruct it.

I took the concept of anamorphosis as a tool to develop my experimentation. Anamorphosis (from the Greek ana = again and morphoun = to form) is a term originally linked to the visual arts and specifically with the use of perspective. In this context, as stated in Britannica, it means:

“an ingenious perspective technique that gives a distorted image of the subject represented in a picture when seen from the usual viewpoint but so executed that if viewed from a particular angle, or reflected in a curved mirror, the distortion disappears and the image in the picture appears normal”

I had learnt about the concept of anamorphosis in music through void cloud.D(), a piece composed by the composer Carlos Lopes, a close friend of mine. This piece was, precisely, an anamorphosis of Debussy’s La terrasse des audiences au clair de lune. As I briefly studied it (and having played Debussy’s prelude years before) I got intrigued by this compositional process: I could link some gestures and harmonies to Debussy’s piece; this was, however, a completely new composition. Searching more on the subject of anamorphosis, I discovered Johannes Schöllhorn’s piece Anamorphoses – an ensemble piece in seven movements based upon counterpoints from Bach's Art of the Fugue. From Schöllhorn’s program note I understood that, when applied to music, anamorphosis can be a way of working on an already existing piece using a new compositional perspective. In this context, it could be used as a compositional technique where one can picture material in an existing piece from another point of view, distorting it and reshaping it in order to create a new composition.

As someone who has been applying the concept of anamorphosis in the field of music, it is also important to mention the artist and researcher Lucia D’Errico, who decodes Baroque scores through improvisation and usage of different media such as electronics, rather than simply performing these works on her instrument.

In the context of my artistic research I invited the musicologist Mónica Chambel and the composer Catarina Ribeiro to work together with me, for the development of two different anamorphoses of Avec Picasso, ce matin…. The goal of these collaborations was not only to create the anamorphoses but also to reflect on the importance and relevance of collaborative work in the context of experimental music and creation. I chose to work specifically with Mónica, whose work as musicologist has been dedicated to Constança Capdeville’s music, in order to have a broader knowledge of the piece. My work with Catarina, however, simply came as the continuation of a practice I am used to, being a pianist focused on contemporary music: to work closely together with composers on the creation of new compositions.

I also thought on the possibility of developing my own anamorphosis of the piece as an attempt to apply my polyvalent skill set however, in the course of this artistic research I had no time to undertake this project.

These anamorphoses are not meant to be improvisations as they are pre-prepared and written down. They are also not transcriptions in the sense of the philosopher and musicologist Peter Szendy, since these pieces aren’t a personal reading on someone else’s music. This work doesn’t aim to give a subjective impression of Avec Picasso, ce matin… but to resort to this piece as the pretext for different experimentations. These pieces will be new compositions related to an extent to the original, but presenting themselves as independent works. In this chapter I describe the different approaches to Avec Picasso, ce matin… I developed, from the historically informed performance to the subversion approach to the piece via anamorphosis.

Trying to reproduce Avec Picasso, ce matin… in a completely trustworthy way constitutes a challenge. There are two distinct unpublished scores and the remaining materials (tape, light scheme, and theatrical script) were scattered through different archives. The composer resorted to an open score but it’s difficult to find notes clearly explaining how to play the piece. At first glance it’s hard to grasp the content of the score and to picture how one should play it.

There are, however, some materials related to the piece that could help achieve a performance closer to what Constança Capdeville envisioned. These consist of: the two aforementioned scores - Madalena Soveral’s (MS) score and Portuguese National Library’s (PNL) score; the performance resources (tape, light and scenic script); the composer’s program note written for the 10th Edition of Gulbenkian’s Contemporary Music Meetings in 1985; a text about the piece in Maria João Serrão’s book Constança Capdeville. Between Theatre and Music and a recording of the piece presumably made by Jorge Peixinho. In spite of a seemingly good amount of available sources, none of them are completely clear and objective, often presenting contradictions and leading to misunderstanding.

Let us start with the composer’s program note, originally in Portuguese, which I present fully translated below:

“This short piece featuring an incessantly read Picasso text as its background was inspired by an aphorism of the same author: “…To force yourself to use limited means is a constraint that frees invention.”. That way, three “cubes” (A. B. C.) with different rythmic, timbric, technical and expressive characteristics are given to the pianist who, after playing a short recitativo in temple blocks, will proceed to combine and overlap them while being faithful to the character of each cube. A fourth “cube” (D), which works as a cadence, signals the ending of the piece, whose duration must not surpass that of the given tape.”¹

This gives us four important clues about the piece:

1.     There are four different cubes

2.     Cubes A, B and C must be combined and overlapped

3.     The last cube functions as the cadence of the piece

4.     The piece must have the same duration as the tape

Some questions still remain unanswered by the program note. For instance, should each cube be played from beginning to end before being overlapped with other cubes? Is the combination of the cubes random or is there any specific order? Not to mention that a description of the scenic elements is nowhere to be found.

Examining the two scores, yet more questions arise: the PNL score consists of five cubes, not four as mentioned by Capdeville. In this score, cube E works as the cadence of the piece instead of cube D. MS's score is even less explicit: her score also includes five parts, one of these is labelled “tank for B”² and the cadence does not even present a letter associated with it.

Since the program note was published on the 10^th Edition of Gulbenkian’s Contemporary Music’s booklet, one could assume it was written with the PNL score in mind. Nonetheless, this description doesn’t completely match the score.

On Maria João Serrão’s article on Avec Picasso, ce matin… we can find references to the first two performances of the piece, the composer’s program note and a description of the score. Serrão shortly describes each cube individually but doesn’t make any reference to the overlapping of the cubes. Despite that, here we can find information on the scenic prelude (that isn't described anywhere else) and on the cubes, which brings some clarity to parts that are quite deceiving when we only look at the score.  

Concerning the scenic part, Serrão writes:

“As for all her theatre-music works, even the short ones, C.C. created a scenic script in which the pianist enters into a pitch-black stage where two objects lay – a chair and a piano – far apart from each other and two conic spotlights on the ceiling lighten the two objects according to the text and the music.”³

From this description alone, we reach the conclusion that the piece starts with the stage lights off, a chair is used as a prop and there are two conic spotlights lighting the stage from the ceiling. Capdeville’s light script was actually already clear about when the lights must be turned on, where the spotlights should point to and that there are, in fact, a piano and a chair on stage. However, even though the lights are cone-shaped in the light script drawings, it was helpful to find another source supporting this information.

The breakdown of the cubes can clarify some parts of the score but also presents some ambiguous information. For instance, concerning cube B, we learn that the duration of the pauses marked on the score is up to the pianist⁴. For cube D, we can confirm that the clusters occupy more or less an octave and that there are pauses in between the groups of clusters. The information given on cube A, on the other hand, is somehow misleading:

“The material of cube A, that can be seen as a tank⁵, is “almost a tango”, consisting of small rhythmic fragments: the two first ones last 2 beats and the melodic material is a major ninth (E-F, with upper octave, and the rhythm is doted crochet, semiquaver, crochet, crochet). The other three fragments last 4 beats, resort to the same notes but have a different rhythmic pattern, shifting the crochets and semiquavers and intertwining them with crochet pauses, returning to the first rhythmic pattern on the last fragment .”⁶ (Serrão, 2006, page 37)

Firstly, Serrão describes the beats as fourth notes even though an eighth note symbol between parentheses stands next to this cube, likely designating that the beat is the eighth note instead. Secondly, she talks about pitches – a major ninth. However, Capdeville wrote on the score next to this cube: “hit two different parts of the piano soundboard (search for a low pitch and a high pitch sound)”⁷. This part is not to be played on the keyboard but on the piano soundboard.

Finally, the information about cube B on Serrão’s text does not provide much help clearing up the confusion when looking at the score. On the PNL score, cube B appears slashed in half: one part on the first page and the other on the second page. Even though it appears divided, it’s clear that it is the same cube spread over two pages. Moreover, a quick comparison with MS score prooves that the cube should be seen as a whole. Serrão, however, presents another possibility. In her text she describes cube D as comprising two parts: the cluster and the second part of cube B. This way, cubes B and D would be presumably intertwined. This description happens to coincide with the formal scheme of the piece found at the Portuguese National Library.

There is another important piece of information in Maria João Serrão’s text: the author states that for the performance of the piece in Lisbon were added some interventions on the bamboo wind chime.

It is also relevant to analyze the existing recording of the piece. This is an audio recording therefore, there’s no intel on the theatrical part. Nevertheless, Constança Capdeville and Jorge Peixinho were close to each other, often working together, therefore, this performance was probably “fact-checked” by the composer. From this recording I could determine and confirm the structure of the piece. After the recitativo, the performer plays the cube A from beginning to end then playing the cube B fragment directly above cube A. Afterwards, partially plays cube A, then the same cube B fragment and jumps to cube C that is also played from beginning to end. Cube D is played twice afterwards and then the cube B part directly above cube D is played from beginning to end. Now fragments from all cubes are randomly mixed until he starts playing cube E. Contrary to the composer indications on the program note, the performer keeps playing the cube E for a full minute after the tape is finished.

Taking all this into consideration it’s now useful to observe the scores again. It seems clear to me that almost all the information on the piece fits better the PNL score. In MS score cube B is not slashed in half; cube D is fragmented and intertwined with cube B (and named “reservoir to B”) and there is only one bamboo wind chime intervention at the end of the piece.

There is one last source of information on the piece: Madalena Soveral's recollections on the performance of Avec Picasso, ce matin.... Madalena Soveral was my previous piano teacher back in Porto and, as I mentioned before, she was the one who introduced me the piece and gave me its score and tape. Even though we talked about it Madalena Soveral's memories on the performance of the piece were quite vague. She remembered there was a scenic prelude where the pianist sat on a chair facing the audience and made some sort of vocal sound. She also knew there was a light scheme for the piece. However, she had lost these scripts. She told me the cubes were to be intertwined yet she couldn't recall if there was a specific order to it. Madalena Soveral was a prolific contemporary music pianist back in the day. She had many concerts and debuted many pieces both internationally and in Portugal. Since she only performed Avec Picasso, ce matin... once and this performance was almost 40 years ago, it is quite normal that her memories on it aren't very clear. It is common practice for a contemporary music pianist to play certain pieces only once during her/his carrer and the time given to practice and work on the piece is usually short. Having worked in several projects with young composers during my academic studies, I can relate to this. It isn't that these pieces are negligible and that the performer didn't put effort into its performance. However contemporary languages are diverse and it is almost humanly impossible to be able to remember every detail of every piece played.

Despite her recollections being somehow vague, Madalena Soveral was the first one to perform the piece. As she is one of the only sources who are still alive her testimony continues to be relevant. 

Colaboration with the musicologist Mónica Chambel

We can perceive the proposed recreation as a new version of the piece that further expands the possibilities within the score through the addition of other materials related to the composer and her work. These materials were adapted into a new reality, into a new perspective and therefore viewed from a new point of view.

My collaboration with Mónica began as I was searching for the light scheme and the scene’s script of Avec Picasso, ce matin… for my research project. Mónica had, at the time, found all the materials related to this piece and was interested in working on it. We ended up forming a collaboration, whose aim was to recreate together Avec Picasso, ce matin... and later reflect on the importance of collaboration between performers and musicologists when working on poorly documented and unedited transdisciplinary pieces from the second half of the 20^th century, where a portion of the material is lost. Our work was to be presented in a conference in Portugal (ENIM - 10th Meeting on Research in Music) in November of 2021. 

Our collaboration developed from May to November of 2021 with some interruptions. We first had online meetings and later, in November, before the conference, we met in person in order to finish our presentation.

We spent the first few meetings discussing and analyzing all the materials we had and the artistic and theoretical framework of the recreation.

Mónica studied the work of the pianist and artistic researcher Paulo de Assis, whom she admired for his view on musical works. He understands them not as something that should be reproduced (Werktreue) but as a network that encompasses everything that was already done, said, written or performed on and about the piece. This concept is materialized on a performance through the inclusion of various media such as letters, critical reviews, testimonies, other recordings, drafts, etc. Paulo de Assis’ influence led Mónica proposing to resort to the "scraps/effects (Picasso)" as a starting point for our recreation and to apply elements from other Capdeville's pieces in our recreation. 

On the other hand, prior to our collaboration I had learned about the composer Heiner Goebbels’ Aesthetics of Absence. Applied by the composer to his music theatre works, the aesthetic of absence consists of the removal from the performance of everything that is conceptualized to be a crucial element. This removal doesn’t have to be literally materialized on the absence of an element (such as the main actor). Absence can be materialized on the dissonance between elements such as visual and audio elements (to hear a musician play but not to see that musician) or the displacement of the performer from the center of attention.

Goebbels’ Aesthetics of Absence ended up being one of the main influences on the recreation of the theatrical prelude of the piece. The idea of absence was inspired by our interpretation of certain moments of Avec Picasso, ce matin…’s original light scheme and scene. For instance, the piece starts with a black out during which the performer places a chair next to the piano. After the performer leaves the stage, two lights light up: one over the chair and the other one over the piano. This idea of starting a piece without the performer, or without the performer being the center of attention, led us to the idea of absence.

Our first step was to select from the "scraps" the materials we found more engaging from a creative point of view. These included:

• one of the marimba improvisations
• the dance like motives
• the music box
• the cuckoo's clock
• the birds singing
• chimes

Afterwards we discussed how these audios could work as compositional material in our recreation. We considered:

• transcribing the selected audios and adapt it in order to be able to play it on a piano or in small percussion or toy instruments
• modify the piece's tape and add some of the "scraps" to it
• instead of applying these materials in a literal way, extract concepts from it and then alter the form of the piece or the way the sections are connected to each other

Since the audio quality of the "scraps" was poor and disparate from the piece's tape, we ended up resorting more to the transcription of these sounds to the acoustic realm. I made some experimentation on the piano and later transcribed the chosen excerpts with the aid of a music notation software. In the transcription process I tried to stay as close as possible to the timbral, rhythmic and expressive qualities of the original audios. Per exemple: 

• when transcribing the marimba parts I muffled the piano strings in order to get a more percussive sound
• we decided to perform the music box on a toy piano so that the sound had a similar quality 
• I experimented stroking the piano strings while playing a cuckoo's whistle to emulate a cuckoo's clock striking the time

The next step was to argue how could we employ these materials in our recreation. We contemplated as options:

• adding new "cubes" to the piece
• replacing the material of the already existing cubes 
• adding newly recorded sounds (base on our transcriptions to the tape)

Our preludium starts off stage - as a reference to other Capdeville’s pieces - and gets intertwined with the theatrical scene leading to the subsequent actions of the piece. In order to better integrate this preludium with the rest of the piece and motivated by the fact that at the venue and context where the piece was going to be performed we wouldn't have a light technician to work with us we decided to also alter the original scene and light scheme. It's interesting to reflect on how the lack of technical means lead to artistic decisions.This attitude matches the already quoted basic principle Capdeville resorted to when composing Avec Picasso, ce matin...: "...To force yourself to use limited means it’s a constraint that frees invention".

So that I can further explain our choices and influences I’ll first describe this first part of the piece:

As I mentioned before, the piece starts off stage where the performer plays the music box theme and its distortions. On stage there's a chair with a clay bird on top next to the piano and a toy piano on the floor in front of the chair. The audience can't see neither of these elements because all the stage lights are off.  While this actions are taking place, a tape with the music box theme and its distortion (the same the performer is playing off stage) starts playing in the loudspeakers. The performer stops playing and enters on stage with a flashlight. The performer stands next to the chair, points the flashlight to the toy piano and the chair and turns it flashlight on, starring at the audience while the tape continues playing the music box theme distorted. When the tape shifts from the toy piano to the original tape (the surrealist text) the performer places the flashlight (still on) on the chair, with its light facing the audience, and sits on the floor in front of the toy piano keyboard, with his/her back facing the audience. The performer now plays the music box theme slower and slower emulating a music box dying off. After the performer hears the sentence "... le lion qui se déguise en torero..." on the tape, he stands up and sits on the chair, playing now the clay bird and pointing the flashlight to the empty piano. After the tape's cue "...sur le dos retenant son haleine..." the performer stands up, places the flashlight (now off) and the clay bird on the chair and moves to the piano where she/he starts playing the recitativo once she/he hears the words "...dans le baiser une punaise de soleil si la...".

This is the part of the recreation that is more influenced by the aforementioned Goebbels' aesthetics of absence. Absence is represented through: the fact that the piece starts off stage; the appearance of the performer on stage when holding the flashlight while the music box theme is playing on the tape; the moment when the performer plays toy piano with her/his back faces the audience.

The recitativo and the cube A of the piece were also altered. The recitativo, originally played in temple blocks, was switched for the marimba improvisation presented above. We chose this excerpt because of its similitude to the original recitativo: not only this excerpt was originally played in a percussion instrument but also presented an improvisatory and free character. To emulate a more percussive sound we opted to play this part muffling the piano’s strings. The cube A, originally a sequence of rhythms to be played in the piano soundboard and accompanied by the indication “quasi tango”, was replaced by a simple and naïve dance for guitar and piano we found on the "scraps". Like in the original audio, we decided to maintain the muffled strings on the melody.

In the context of this recreation we took as reference the PNL score. We kept the cubes C and D intact, but we intensified their overlap during the performance. So that we could create a more chaotic sense, we decided to add a new cube. For it we resorted to the excerpt of the “scraps” with the cuckoo’s clock. In the last block (the cadence of the piece) we also took some inspiration form the “scraps”. This time we swapped the bamboo chimes in the end for the bird whistle (also as a reference to the scene in the beginning of the piece) and bell chimes.

The stage design in Joana Sá and Henrique Fernandes’ concert at Guimarães Jazz inspired the ending of Catarina’s piece - gongs were suspended in the ceiling and that was the only visible thing in the beggining of the concert. Catarina’s piece has the indication to place a suspended gong on the stage. At the end of the performance, the pianist must jump from the chair to the gong.

This final movement of the piece – jumping from the chair towards the gong – is meant to represent release. The concept of release was something highly discussed in our meetings and is deeply linked with the ideas of mediation and stretching. Both meditation and stretching can be seen as means of achieving release: the former, mental release; the latter, physical release. We also discussed about how getting older could be a form of liberation. We played with the idea of metamorphosis in this context, a "metamorphosis of freedom" as Catarina called it. On this subject, Catarina wrote what I believe became the synopsis of the piece:

"A body that feels trapped and finds its way to expression, that accepts its mistakes, its insecurities and weaknesses, and goes its own way; there is a bodily and physical disobedience; a body that accepts to be free and accepts the surrealism of life and of all the cubes that we are"⁹

Even if we cannot see it in a literal way, all the cubes of Catarina’s piece are related to Avec Picasso, ce matin…’s cubes. As I referred earlier, we understood that the pitches on Capdeville’s cubes were subservient to the gesture, like they work as a vehicle to movement and not the other way round. Catarina took this idea to the extreme and conceptualized cubes only as gestures. She doesn’t write concrete pitches. Instead, she writes a gestural direction in which notes must be played, but these are random and less important than the gesture itself.

As I am writing this text the piece is already complete. All of our meetings have taken place and we have met and experimented with various materials. This text is a reflection on the shared creative process that took place the last six months. I reheard our meetings and reflected on every conversation. I will now try to create links between our discussions and Catarina’s score.

By the end of our first meeting, on October 1st 2021, I asked Catarina how she would approach anamorphosis in the context of her own piece. As aforementioned, I knew Catarina was familiar with the meaning of this concept. However, I gave her the liberty to experiment with it and explore it in a personal way. She told me:

“I thought about it on a microscopic level. I am interested in a certain number of parts from the original piece and I observed them through a microscope. There, I saw two or three cells that looked peculiar to me and those were the cells I thought I wanted to explore. I’m not interested in doing something very broad. I might resort to some of Avec Picasso, ce matin… materials, such as the percussion on the piano soundboard or other parts that I feel as personal to the piece. However, my process is going to be more minuscule." ³

Examining the score on a more superficial level, we can easily identify some elements from Capdeville’s piece:

1. The piece is in open form

2. The piece is divided in "cubes"

3. The cube H is very similar to Avec Picasso, ce matin…’s cube C

4. There is a theatrical scene both in the prelude and the postlude of the piece

5. There is a chair on stage from the beginning of the piece

6. The score was engraved by hand in an attempt to emulate Capdeville’s score

These are the most proeminent ideas that Catarina took from Capdeville’s piece. At a certain point she spoke about the possibility of creating a cube with clusters, similar to Avec Picasso, ce matin…’s cube D (PNL score). This cube, however, didn’t make it to the final version of the piece.

Taking a closer look at the score, on a microscopical level, we can find much more elements taken from the original piece. These details were also discussed during our meetings.

For instance, Catarina first approached Capdeville's piece through the tape’s text. Knowing about her affinity to poetry, it sounds quite natural that she leaned towards it. Her approach to the text was quite intuitive: her main exercise was to read it, grasp some general impressions and brainstorm imagery and emotions she felt throughout her first readings. She also took textual references that allured her and that she felt could easily connect to more concrete ideas and sonic material.

The text ended up being her main source of material. It was from it that she draw the main concept for the piece and took ideas for the use of light and gesture.

There were two specific parts of the text that captured her attention:

1.     “(…) On a dish in balance a slice of moon in the shadow makes the silence shatter (…)”⁴

2.     “(…) the light that falls and shatters in his face rings the bell that frightens the cathedral with its farewell gestures (…)”⁵

From these excerpts she took the key-words "balance", "silence" and "shatter". The second excerpt was her main inspiration for thinking about the use of light. The words "balance" and "silence" ended up being of utter importance, connecting to her idea of meditation that became the basis for the narrative of the piece.

I first approached the composer Catarina Ribeiro in September 2021. Catarina and I were colleagues when I started my bachelor’s in composition in 2017. Having studied with her I had the opportunity of learning about her interests, creative process, and aesthetic quite well. Catarina partook in theatre groups when she was younger, developing this way a close affinity to acting, dramaturgy, spoken work and literature. Gingko (2020) for orchestra, Gargalo (2021) for chamber ensemble (winner of the 2^nd prize of Póvoa do Varzim’s International Composition Competition), or Kairox (2022) for piano solo reflect the importance of perspective and visual arts (in Gargalo), nature (in Gingko) and metaphysics (in Kairox) in her work and creative process. As stated in her biography:

“(…) the continuous and restless presence of various fields of interest in her life still has an impact on her creative process; from the years dedicated to drawing, ceramics, amateur theatre or love for poetry, to her deep-rooted devotion for nature (…) and her contemplation of all organic forms, particularly botanic ones.”¹

Influenced by the aforementioned aspects, Catarina’s music also reflects a deep connection with sound itself which she explores through orchestration, timbre, gesture and movement.

On the other hand, Capdville’s body of work is described as something that “reflects the aesthetics of inseparability between life and art, at the same time stressing the importance of sound, body/gesture and literary research of her work.”^2. Since Capdeville had a metaphysical approach to music based on timbral exploration and connected to theatre and literature, and knowing that Catarina’s music takes upon many of the same principles, she was one of the first people that came to mind to work with me in this project.

I proposed to Catarina the creation of an anamorphosis of Avec Picasso, ce matin… I knew she already had some insight regarding the concept and I reasured Catarina that I wanted her to be free to explore it her own way - her own perspective of anamorphosis. The idea was for her to resort to the same elements that constitute Capdveille's piece: tape, light and theatrical scene. I gave her full access to all the materials and shared with her my knowledge on Constança Capdeville and the piece. Moreover, we decided to meet regularly in order to exchange thoughts on her ongoing compositional and creative process, so that I had a deeper insight into it. Every meeting was recorded for me to reflect on it afterwards. I also experimented with some of her ideas during her compositional process. Catarina's new piece is, therefore, the result of a collaborative process between a composer and a performer.