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The traditional Música Llanera arises on the flat plains (Los Llanos) of the river Orinoco in Venezuela and Colombia. This music, mostly composed by rural farmers, thunders forward in a fierce gallop and has been over the years a source of inspiration for many folk composers, singers and writers. 

 

In the Joropo, a popular music and dance kind, the musical traditions of South American aboriginals melt together with that of African slaves and Spanish colonists.  The merge results in continuous and peerless grooves, pounding feet and simple tunes that cut straight through the soul. 

 

Joropo is one of the fastest and most popular folk rhythms; couples dance face to face holding hands, using a particular movement of the feet, and portraying a clear difference between masculine and feminine. It is a dance with a constant pulse, and identifies the “llaneros”. The typical ensembles that plays this music includes harp, the bandola (a small pear-shape chordophone), the cuatro (a small 4-strings guitar) and other autochthonous instruments, accompanied by maracas  (castanet shaker) and mostly with voice. 

 

 

mask for the folk dance ‘Diablos de Llare’

 

The performance Pulso Llanero gets its inspiration from the unexampled characteristics of the Joropo genre: a complex rhythmical structure that is associated with a folkloric tradition, smooth and organic alternation of tempi, sharp and percussive character.

 

Pulso Llanero features a unique combination of new contemporary works specially written for the project, together with sparkling arrangements of folk tunes from the northern coast of South-America.

 

The line up of Ensemble Black Pencil for this program consists of Blockflutes (Jorge Isaac), Panflute (Matthijs Koene), Viola (Esra Pehlivanli), Percussion (Enric Monfort), and Accordion (Marko Kassl).  The program consists of new works written by the Dutch composers Guus Janssen (1951), Roderik the Man (1941), Chiel Meijering (1954), André Douw (1961), Nico Huijbregts (1961), Michiel Mensingh (1975) and South-American composers from different generations, such as Mirtru Escalona–Mijares (Venezuela/France, 1976), Héctor Moro (Chile/Germany, 1965), Louis Aguirre (Cuba/Denmark, 1968).

 

Pulso Llanero is a performance of ca.  65 minutes, full of contrast and diversity.  The performance combines unique instrumental sounds (including an original mixture of typical percussion instruments from South-American) and virtuosic instrumental music, sometimes serene and lyrical, sometimes restless and freely aggressive, pleasantly complex in colour and rhythm. An exciting performance with endless inspiration. 

 

Listen to the ensemble Black Pencil

 

 

 

 

 

 

miniature by Mehmet Siyah Kalem

 

 

"I am Mehmed the Black Pencil, master of humans and Jinns..."

Mehmed Siyah Kalem (Mehmed the Black Pencil) became known with those words for centuries. Nothing is certain about his life, but his work indicates that he was thoroughly familiar with camp and military life as they depicted nomads, ordinary people, dervishes, Christian monks, Buddhists, shamans etc. The paintings appear in the “Conqueror’s Albums,” so named because two portraits of Sultan Mehmed II the Conqueror are present in one of them. The albums are made up of miniatures taken from manuscripts of the 14th, 15th, and early 16th centuries.

 

The uniqueness in the art of Siyah Kalem (Black Pencil) lies in his depictions of supernatural creatures. The essence and inspiration of the ‘BLACK PENCIL’ performance is derived from the expressive power of those miniatures. A blend between illusion and illustration, sometimes flat, sometimes exuberant, electro-acoustic sounds together with the sound of traditional Turkish instruments. 

 

 

 

The ensemble features Jorge Isaac (blockflutes), Esra Pehlivanli (viola), Matthijs Koene (panflute), Mehmet Polat (ud) and Enric Monfort (percussion). Optional video images are also possible, performed live by Marcel Wierckx. The video projection frames the audience in a dynamic way, comprising visuals that mirror the aesthetics and colours of the original miniatures by Mehmed Siyah Kalem.

 

The program includes works by Dutch and Turkish composers with different roots and styles, namely Roderik de Man (1941), Selim Dogru (1971), Gökçe Altay (1975), Mehmet Can Ozer (1981), Yigit Kolat (1984), Hakan Toker (1976) and Tolga Ozdemir (1975).

 

The flow and tension of the performance remains surprising, rich in colour, in a fluid musical trip. 

 

The total duration of the program is ca.  65 minutes, without pause. 

 

Listen to the ensemble Black Pencil

 

 

 

 

PROGRAMME

 

Selim Dogru (1971): Six Scenes (2010) **

for blockflute, panflute, viola, ud and percussion

 

Interlude 1 (Tolga Ozdemir: Karadeniz)

for viola and vibraphone

 

Gökçe Altay (1975): Efendi (2010) *

for blockflute, panflute, viola, ud, percussion and TAPE

 

Interlude 2 (Hakan Toker: Notenbuch)

for viola and vibraphone

 

Interlude 3

for panflute solo

 

Yigit Kolat (1984): Miniatures (2010) *

for blockflute, panflute, viola, ud, percussion and electronics

 

Interlude 4 (B.C. Manjunath/Duo)

for contrabass blockflute and cajón

Interlude 5 (Mehmet Polat/Curious)

for ud solo

 

Interlude 6 (Tolga Ozdemir/Pantoral) *

for blockflute, panflute, viola, ud and percussion

 

Roderik de Man (1941): Black Pencil Music (2010) **

for blockflute, panflute, viola, percussion and electronics

 

* Commissioned by the VisiSonor Foundation

** Commissioned by the Performing Arts Fund NL