Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Day 24 - Galego Music

As anyone who knows me realizes, I am not the musical one in my marriage. And that is an understatement! But Galego music can be pretty interesting. I have already talked a bit about the Gaita, and although it's not my personal favorite, it is quite unique as an instrument on the Peninsula. What makes it so unique, in my opinion is that it is an instrument generally associated with Scotland and the northern Celtic regions. But as I have mentioned before there is a large Celtic influence in Galicia and that of course includes the music of the region as well.

Pandeireta and Ferreña
This past Sunday, I visited the Museo do Pobo Galego and took a few pictures of some other typical Galego instruments including the Pandeireta and the Ferreñas, two instruments that I would generically categorize as tambourines but are perhaps a bit more unique than just that... I don't know, but I'm sure Shawn would. He even mentioned one of them by name when I told him that I had seen these particular instruments but did not remember the name of them at the time we were talking.

Gaita




On Monday, our mid-day conference was on Galego music. It was a discussion lead by the Galician Folk artist, Uxía (you may recognize her name from the Duas Marias post) and her fellow musician Xoan. Not only did they discuss some of the history of the music as well as certain themes in the lyrics (cultural and language pride among others), but they also performed for us. And I really, really wanted to post a video for you to listen to, but I have been sitting here for a good half hour and it is not uploading... so I'll just have to leave you with a picture of the event... which is a real shame since it is difficult to appreciate the music without hearing it. If you go to youtube and look for Uxía, you will definitely find something. Try the following links to start:

Tua nai é meiga
Alalá das mariñas

Uxía and Xoan


If you are interested in music, I would highly recommend looking into more information than I could possibly give you on Galician music. From my few experiences I get the impression that it is a music that people are quite passionate about. It doesn't take much to get a song started and a dance going. This was proven today when we had our end of course picnic in Teo. People from different countries sang songs from their countries and the professors also decided to sing a song for the group. Their song resulted in a dance which you can see in the picture below. Once the music started it did not stop until we got on the bus. It was probably a good three hours of music all told. Maybe a bit much for me, but all of the Galegos, and many of the other students really seemed to enjoy it.
Galgeo Professors: singing and dancing

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