This year our Halloween soundtrack is De Brujas y Fantasmas (Of Witches and Ghosts), inspired by the legend of La Llorona and the Mexican poet-shaman María Sabina. This collaboration was conceived by Ziúr and director, choreographer and dancer Kianí del Valle, and has already debuted in Vienna and Berlin. While terrifying on the surface, the music exposes the irrational fear of female power and replaces it with profound respect.
The music is frightening, the legends and ghost stories even more so; but the way in which women have been used as scapegoats and transformed into cautionary tales is the most frightening aspect of all. “La Llorona De Noche” begins with dark, sluggish beats, like the footsteps of a lumbering beast; then darker chords, like the outstretched arms of an inescapable monster. Church bells toll, symbolizing the struggle between good and evil; but they may also symbolize the ways in which churches contribute to the problem. Counter-intuitively, this makes the sound of the church the track’s darkest aspect. As the piece grows in intensity, the listener is filled not only with dread, but with the question of whether what one is running toward is ultimately more dangerous than what one is running from.
“Luna Negra” (which will be followed later in the set by “Luna Llena”) channels the power of the moon, while serving as a reminder that witches and moons are inextricably linked. Apart from the far more benign E.T., few figures are as associated with moons as witches on broomsticks: a symbol of domesticity turned into an object of fear – much less so, it must be written, for the one riding it. And therein lies the incongruence. In some cultures, female wisdom and power are revered, while in others they are considered evil. Only in the modern era have the arts turned their attention to the positive aspects of witches, in an attempt to demythologize all that has come before. Ziúr’s music does two things at once: it frightens, and it owns that fear.
Sabina’s use of mushrooms helped her to “break down the barrier between the physical world and the spirit realm.” In the disjointed mumbles and moans of “Hechizo Metamorfo,” one may hear the spiritual world intruding on this realm, recalling All Souls’ Night; in the rapid percussion, one may picture a frenzied dance around a fire, conjuring the spirits of the dead. “Hexentanz” begins with a beat like “La Llorona De Noche,” but quickly accelerates and falls out of step, like a ritualistic spell. The beats are like gunfire, the synthesized notes like stolen souls. del Valle’s choreography here is an homage to Wigman’s “The Witch Dance,” performed exactly a hundred years ago.
History has revealed the ways in which men of power have terrorized women over millennia, imprisoning, torturing and killing those whom they fear, making them scapegoats for the ills of society while they themselves have been the root of the problem. In one sense we have become enlightened; we no longer burn suspected witches at the stake. In another sense, we continue the practice of the witch hunt in more occluded ways; we continue to disparage, label and marginalize the most vulnerable. Witches and ghosts, as real or unreal as they may be, are no match for the narcissistic leader who wields power with an unholy hand. (Richard Allen)
