City Research Online

Abstract

Morriña (pronounced more-een-ya) explores notions of identity as seen through the lens of the diasporic Galician-British community. Galicia is a rural region in the North West of Spain that depends economically on fishing and agriculture. The word morriña has no direct English equivalent but can be described as the despondency caused by the nostalgic longing for one’s lost homeland. The word is intimately linked to large numbers of Galicians who were driven by poverty or lack of opportunity to migrate in successive waves from the mid-19th Century onwards. The piece features music, dance and film. and refers to the gestural and musical aspects of baile Gallego. This is a traditional social folk-dance form of Galicia and features musical instruments such as the gaita (Galician bagpipe). Baile Gallego experienced something of a revival in the mid-1970s after Franco’s regime ended and remains a popular and ‘preserved’ aspect of Galician cultural identity to this day. The dance and musical traditions referenced in the piece are refracted so that they can be experienced from a range of different perspectives. Through the re-contextualisation, digital manipulation, and modified perception of audiovisual gestural materials, the piece explores the role of embodied actions, interactions and intentions in dialogical exchange, and the relationship between bodily movement and sound.

Publication Type:	Composition
Additional Information:	Copyright Miguel Mera 2014
Subjects:	M Music and Books on Music > M Music N Fine Arts > N Visual arts (General) For photography, see TR
Departments:	School of Communication & Creativity > Performing Arts > Music

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