THE LIVING COMPOSERS PROJECT  

Graciela Paraskevaídis

(b. 1 April 1940, Buenos Aires – d. 21 February 2017, Montevideo).

Argentinean–Uruguayan composer of mostly chamber, choral, vocal, and piano works that have been performed throughout the Americas and in Asia and Europe; she was also active as a writer.

Prof. Paraskevaídis studied composition with Roberto García Morillo at the Departamento de Artes Musicales Carlos López Buchardo of the Instituto Universitario Nacional del Arte in Buenos Aires, then attended courses with Gerardo Gandini, Iannis Xenakis and other composers at the Instituto Di Tella in Buenos Aires in 1965–66, on a scholarship from the Centro Latinoamericano de Altos Estudios Musicales (CLAEM). She later studied composition with Wolfgang Fortner at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg in Freiburg im Breisgau from 1968–71, on a grant from the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, and attended the Ferienkurse in Darmstadt in 1972.

Among her honours were a residency as a guest of the Berliner Künstlerprogramm of the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (1984–85), the Goethe-Medaille from the Goethe-Institut in Munich (1994, for her efforts on behalf of cultural approach among various peoples) and the Premio Morosoli de plata a trayectoria musical from the Fundación Lolita Rubial in Minas, Uruguay (2006), as well as prizes in Argentina, Germany and Uruguay. She and Coriún Aharonián are the subjects of the book Sonidos y hombres libres. Música nueva de América Latina en los siglos XX y XXI (2014, edited by Hanns-Werner Heister and Ulrike Mühlschlegel, Iberoamericana/Vervuert).

As a writer, she was a specialist in 20th-century music from Latin America and her essays have been published in the Americas and Europe, notably in the magazine MusikTexte in Germany and the music journal Pauta in Mexico, to which she was a regular contributor. She also wrote the books La Obra sinfónica de Eduardo Fabini (1992, Trilce/Ediciones Tacuabé) and Luis Campodónico, compositor (1999, Ediciones Tacuabé) and translated Schoenbergs Zeichen by Jean-Jacques Dünki as Los Signos de Schoenberg (2005, Monte Ávila Editores). She served as co-editor of the yearbook of ISCM World New Music Magazine from 1990–99 and contributed to the dictionary Komponisten der Gegenwart (edited by Hanns-Werner Heister and Walter-Wolfgang Sparrer, edition text + kritik) from 1992–2017.

She was also active in other positions. She organised numerous events for the permanent collective of the Cursos Latinoamericanos de Música Contemporánea from 1975–89. She was a member of the Núcleo Música Nueva de Montevideo and the Sociedad Uruguaya de Música Contemporánea and was a former member of the Núcleo Música Nueva de Buenos Aires and the Sociedad Argentina de Música Contemporánea. In addition, she co-founded with Max Nyffeler the website latinoamérica música in 2004 and served as its co-editor from 2004–17.

She taught extensively in private and at the Universidad de la República in Montevideo from 1985–92. She gave lectures, seminars and workshops in Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Germany, Greece, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK, and Uruguay.

She lived in Uruguay from 1975–2017 and was a citizen of both Argentina and Uruguay.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Website: http://www.gp-magma.net/

Website (latinoamérica música): http://www.latinoamerica-musica.net/

SELECT LIST OF WORKS

STAGE:

Aphorismen (text by Karl Kraus), 2 speakers, piano, percussion, fixed media, 1969

Mozart (text by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart), actor, ensemble, 1970–72

CHAMBER MUSIC:

magma I, 4 French horns, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, tuba, 1965–67

magma II, 4 trombones, 1968

Trío, flute, clarinet, bassoon, 1969

mellonta tauta, accordion, 1970

magma III, flute, trombone, cello, piano, 1974

magma IV, string quartet, 1974

magma V, 4 quena (flutes from South America), 1977

todavía no, 3 flutes, 3 clarinets, 1979

magma VI, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, 1979

más fuerza tiene, clarinet, 1984

magma VII, 14 winds, 1984

dos piezas para pequeño conjunto, oboe, clarinet, trumpet, piano, claves, 1989

sendas, flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, French horn, trumpet, trombone, piano, 1992

el nervio de arnold, guitar, 1992

'algún sonido de la vida', 2 oboes, 1993

ta, flute, oboe, clarinet, piano, 1994

No quiero oír ya más campanas, 14 winds, 1995

dos piezas para oboe y piano, oboe, piano, 1995

hacen así, 6 percussion, 1996

altibajos, 2 double basses, 1996

libres en el sonido presos en el sonido, flute (+ alto flute), clarinet (+ E-flat clarinet, bass clarinet), violin, cello, piano, 1997

suono sogno, violin, 1997

solos, alto flute, guitar, 1998

piezas de bolsillo, 4 percussion, 1999

...Il Remoto Silenzio, cello, 2002

'Soy de un país donde', French horn, trumpet, trombone, tuba, 2002

¿Y si fuera cierto?, alto flute, English horn, piano, 2003

y allá andará según se dice, 24 players (several siku [pan flutes from South America], several tarka [wooden flutes from South America], several pinkillo [large flutes from South America]), claves (2 players), 2 wankara (drums from South America), 2004

tris, oboe, bassoon, double bass, 2005

ático, sopranino recorder, piccolo, 2006

álibi, 4 saxophones, 2008

... bajo otros cielos..., winds from South America, percussion from South America, 2011

CHORAL:

La Terra e la Morte (text by Cesare Pavese), mixed chorus, 1968

'libertà va cercando...' (text by Dante Alighieri), mixed chorus, 1969

E desidero solo colori (text by Cesare Pavese), female chorus, 1969

Die Hand voller Stunden (text by Paul Celan), 9 mixed voices, 1970

Schattenreich (text by Hans Magnus Enzensberger), 4 mixed voices, 1972

der Weg (text from the Old Testament), 9 mixed voices, brass, 1973

el grito en el cielo, mixed chorus, 1987

discordia, 9 mixed voices, 1998

VOCAL:

Seis Canciones españolas (text by Miguel Hernández), soprano, piano, 1968

Schatten (text by Karl Kraus), soprano, baritone, 1970

nada, soprano, 1993

pero están, soprano, flute, oboe, 1994

Aruaru, mezzo-soprano, clarinet, violin, cello, piano, 2003

PIANO:

un lado, otro lado, 1984

tres piezas infantiles, 1986

otra vez, 1994

en abril, 1996

...a hombros del ruiseñor, 1997

contra la olvidación, 1998

dos piezas para piano, 2001

cada cual, piano 4 hands, 2010

HARPSICHORD:

réplica, 2006

ELECTROACOUSTIC:

huauqui, fixed media, 1975

A entera revisación del público en general, fixed media, 1978–81