NACHMO 2023

"Carmen’s poetic ideas were present as subjective triggers, but as structural premises as well. One example is the idea of “mirror” between the two dancers, which gave form to mirroring musical materials at the beginning: some initial melodies are, in a second moment, played backward; there are “vertical mirrorings”, in which the musical intervals on the piano are played inverted by the harp (if one goes upwards, the other goes downard, and vice-versa); and some metallic sounds are played backward.
In dialogue with the idea of having contact with a “dark” or unconscious side within ourselves, this piece was thought of as a “crescendo”, starting with subtle dynamics and gradually acquiring more restlessness. Thus, ideas that appear delicate at the start may become more aggressive when revisited. On the other hand, our aggressiveness may be permeated by subtleties, breaking the idea of a pure dichotomy."