Photo: Daniel Moreira · © Alexandre Delmar
Questionnaire/ Interview
Part 1 · Roots & Education
· How did music begin for you and where do you identify your music roots? ·
Daniel Moreira: In less formal terms, it began very early, since my parents have always listened to a lot of music at home, preferring it even more than watching television. My paternal grandfather was also an amateur musician – he used to play the piano and accordion – and I think that my connection with music also comes from there. In more formal terms, the contact with music happened somewhat later. It truly began at the preparatory cycle (5th and 6th year) with Music Education, which was fundamental to understand that learning music was not such a big deal (as I’d thought before!), but actually something that motivated me a lot, since I seemed to approach it with a certain ease.
· Which paths led you to composition? ·
DM: After this Music Education experience at school, in the 6th year I applied for the Conservatoire of Music in Porto and I joined the recorder class – the instrument which I started studying at school. After that it took me some time to find my path: firstly there were no compatible time schedules; then I went to study clarinet at the Avintes Band, at the invitation of José Ferreira, my Music Education teacher; and then I lost interest in the instrument and I started studying guitar. It was this instrument that I then continued to learn (until the 8th year, with professor Artur Caldeira). However, only when I took Analysis and Composition Technique classes with professor João-Heitor Rigaud, did I truly feel to have found what really interested me. The fascination with composition technique was instantaneous, and it has never stopped growing ever since! Actually, when I finished secondary education (in 2001) it was clear that I would follow a composition course, but since I was still at the Conservatoire, it seemed better to me to start another one. And thus, simultaneously to studying music, I did Economics at the University of Porto. In the middle of the Economics course, I started experimenting with composing longer pieces – not only short studies, as until then –, and I realised that there was no other thing that would make me so enthusiastic as composing. It was obvious that, after finishing the course, I needed to try Composition. Luckily, this decision of mine had all the support of my parents and family.
· Which moments from your music education do you find the most important? ·
DM: Apart from what I’ve already mentioned in the previous answer, I would emphasise my experience as a student at the ESMAE (Music and Performance Arts College), in Porto, between 2006 and 2010. It was a time of a great learning, when every week I seemed to discover a new world, with the closest support of my composition teachers from this phase, Dimitris Andrikopoulos and Fernando C. Lapa. I would also highlight my later experience in London, where I did my Doctorate in Composition at the King’s College, with George Benjamin and Silvina Milstein. Working with George Benjamin was particularly crucial, since it encouraged me to question everything, I’d been doing until then and to adopt an attitude towards composition that was both more demanding and more pragmatic. These four years (between 2012 and 2016) were very important, not only because of how much I learnt, but also for having participated a little in such an active and cosmopolitan environment as the London one. These years also allowed me to see with more distance – and perhaps more objectivity – the reality of Portuguese music and culture; by the way, 80% of the music that I wrote during that time was vocal music with Portuguese texts. In addition to these academic contacts, likewise, participating in the seminars with various ensembles and orchestras, such as the Remix Ensemble Casa da Música, the Diotima Quartet, the Gulbenkian Orchestra and the London Symphony Orchestra, turned out to be decisive. These seminars give the emerging composer the privilege to work on his or her piece directly with the musicians, without the pressure of an immediate concert, and it’s there that one effectively learns a lot of things in practice. Another crucial experience was being an active member of Coral de Letras da Universidade do Porto for 14 years, from 2004 to 2018. There I learned many fundamental things about music – and thus about composition: for instance, how to lead a musical phrase or how to give it meaning. And I learnt that not in theory, but in practice, with José Luís Borges Coelhos's always illuminated guidance. And finally, I go backwards in time towards one of the initial experiences. Between 1997 and 2000 I studied guitar with Rui Vilhena, a prominent guitarist and member of the Vozes da Rádio (Radio Voices). The lessons consisted of repeating mainly pop-rock music by ear and thus learning to play it. It was fantastic to start learning to play an instrument by ear – and not from the score – and within an area not restricted to classical music. I learnt a lot with it, and it has reinforced my ever strong relation with rock music.
Part 2 · Influences & Aesthetics
· In your opinion, what can a music discourse express and/ or mean? ·
DM: The good in music – and generally in art – is that it has a lot of different meanings. It doesn’t seem to me that a given music, or a given piece has a fixed or obligatory meaning: everything depends a lot on the context of who is listening, playing, where and when it’s played. Music is not only the sound circulating in the air: music is an interpretative act, which emerges from the interaction between the sonic stimulus and the body and the mind of a culturally situated listener. Actually, since I also work a lot in the field of music Theory, Analysis and Aesthetics, these are fascinating questions which I pose on a daily basis. When it comes to these matters, I’m not exclusivist at all: I think that music has (or can have) corporeal and emotional, temporal and philosophical, sociological and ideological meanings, in addition to the ones that are more purely technical or “specifically musical”. In the case of my music, it’s not up to me to say which meanings it can have; if it has any, the listeners will tell, certainly giving – I hope! – very different points of view.
· Are there any extra-musical sources, which influence your work in a significant way? ·
DM: In my case, the most important extra-musical reference is certainly the cinema, which interests and fascinates me as much as music itself. Therefore, I have a lot of pieces influenced by different aspects of the cinema – from general techniques (such as zoom or editing), up to narrative structure, sounds and ambiences of particular films. Various listeners have already told me that my music is very visual, and it may have to do with this cinematic fascination. However, things don’t have to be coincidental when it comes to the composer’s conscious process and the aesthetic result. Hence, once again, it’s up to each listener to judge.
· In the context of Western art music, do you feel close to any school or aesthetics from the past or the present? ·
DM: I feel affinities with various currents, and they have been varying a lot throughout time. At this moment, in September 2020, and focusing only on 21st century music, I would highlight the music by Ben Frost (particularly the soundtrack for the German series Dark); the music by Hans Abrahamsen (Schnee in particular); the highly musical sound design by David Lynch (particularly in the series Twin Peaks: The Return); some contemporary “classical” English music (Adès, Benjamin and Knussen); music by the Radiohead and Björk; and some music by post-spectral composers (Haas and Saariaho). Once again, I don’t know up to which point these references are transparent to the listener, though various of them have been important in my most recent piece – a concerto for orchestra and electronics entitled Isto não é um filme (This is not a film). For me it’s obvious that all these references are “art music”, insofar as they are highly sophisticated in terms of techniques and aesthetics, deliberately aiming (and, in my opinion, succeeding) to provide a multifaceted and rich aesthetic experience.
· Are there any influences of non-Western cultures in your music? ·
DM: Not many. I appreciate and value a lot the music from other cultures, but I don’t believe that any of them has had a very direct influence on my music. The one that I got to know better is the music from Mozambique, particularly from the south, since I regularly visited Maputo between 2015 and 20 17 in the framework of the Xiquitsi project. I got to know some fascinating music, both the more purely traditional one and the marrabenta, which mixes traditional rhythms and European harmonies. It is true that my music has become more rhythmical after these journeys to Africa. Yet here I wouldn’t find any causal nexus, because this would imply reducing African music to a certain European stereotype (of “very rhythmical music”). Anyway, I would like to get to know better the music from other cultures. If I effectively do it, perhaps I will be able to bring something new to my own music. The important thing is that the references one brings stay authentic and profound, and not merely superficial.
· What does “avant-garde” mean to you and what nowadays can be considered as avant-garde? ·
DM: I must confess that it’s not a question that interests me a lot as composer. This term is greatly associated with a certain historical context within classical Western music and, frankly speaking, in 2020 it seems to me quite distant. Actually, there was a whole series of assumptions in the avant-garde’s basis – such as the notion of stylistic progress, and the idea of a radical separation between art and popular music. To me, nowadays they don’t seem to make a lot of sense. This doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate immensely certain “avant-garde” music (for example Boulez is one of my preferred composers). It only means that today there are so many options and such diversified practices, that it seems to me somewhat inglorious to try to define what is and what is not avant-garde. To be in the avant-garde is to be ahead of the others; but there is no single path where ones would be in front and the others behind. There’s a multiplicity of paths, from the more tonal towards the more atonal ones, from the more melodical to the more textural ones, from the more purely “classical” to the hybrid ones, from the more acoustic to the more electronic ones, from the more purely sonic to the more multimedia ones.
Part 3 · Language & Music Practice
· Characterise your music language, taking into perspective the techniques/ aesthetics developed in music creation in the 20th and 21st centuries, on the one hand, and on the other your personal experience and path since the beginning until now. ·
DM: I don’t know if I actually have a music language: to assume it would be very bold! Anyway, I obviously use various techniques to obtain different results. I think that they gravitate towards these two sides: on the one hand, towards an idea of a sound mass; on the other, towards an idea of layering (in time and space) of musical materials. The first one derives largely from my study of Ligeti’s micropolyphonic techniques, Reich’s phasing techniques and from the spectral notion of timbre-harmony. The second one has its origin in the techniques of superimposing layers (in space) and abruptly juxtaposing contrasting materials (in time) – both of them through the music of Stravinsky. Actually, until the beginning of my Doctorate in London, in 2012, my music had tended a lot towards the first side – the sonic masses. After that, it became more inclined towards the second one, without any doubt, under the influence of the British context, where the transparency of texture is usually more valued. More recently, I have been trying to combine these two aspects. As I have already mentioned, I also often use techniques inspired in the language of cinema. The most recent example is the use of contrast as a structural rule at all the levels of composition, being a direct influence of David Lynch’s films and series, where – according to the director – this aspect is absolutely fundamental.
· When it comes to your creative practice, do you develop your music from an embryo-idea or after having elaborated a global form? In other words, do you begin with the micro and move towards the macro-form or vice-versa? Please describe this process. ·
DM: I think that the process is variable and depends on every piece. Yet, since gaining the experience in England I increasingly tend to start with the music material which I have in hand and to try to give it form, instead of assuming an a priori structure and then finding a material that would fill it. I prefer to take a certain material – either a chord, a scale, a rhythm or an electroacoustic sample – and to try to discover what it can give to me; not to impose in advance my will on it, but rather to listen to it, to let it speak. And from the many paths, which it offers – the ones that I’m able to unveil – I choose one (other composers would see other possibilities and choose other paths). There’s thus a certain idea of discovery and uncertainty in the process which I particularly appreciate, since it means that I can surprise myself. Moreover, I have the impression that only when the material surprises us, can we hope that it will have an impact on the audience. This doesn’t mean that I can’t have a general idea of the piece before starting it, either at the level of the atmosphere or structure. Yet frequently this is only a point of departure, which is then moulded – or modulated – through the specific work with the material.
· How in your music practice do you determine the relation between the reasoning and the creative impulses or the inspiration? ·
DM: I think that there’s a very permeable boarder between reasoning and inspiration. Sometimes what we call inspiration is only a very fast reasoning. And the reasonings involved in the process of composition aren’t necessarily reasonings in the term’s conventional sense, that is, linguistic reasonings expressed by words. The one who composes – as the one who plays an instrument and listens – resorts to a certain form of thought and sensibility, not necessarily linguistic, but specifically sonic and musical. It doesn’t mean that it can’t be expressed in words, and we ourselves as composers need to do it, in order to make the problem in hand clearer. And obviously we use lots of techniques that can be explained by words – or, in some cases, by numbers. However, I think the most important choices – at least for me – are at a different level, which is difficult to qualify as rational or intuitive.
· What is your relationship with the new technologies and how do they influence your music? ·
DM: I’m not the kind of person that creates an easy and immediate relationship with technology. I have always a certain initial resistance or laziness. Yet then, after overcoming it I end up adapting myself a lot. In the case of composition, there’s an aspect that I’ve used for quite some time, which is composing almost exclusively on the computer, and not on paper. And I use techniques which would not work that well on paper. One of them is copy-paste. I enjoy a lot creating certain blocks of material and then overlapping them to see what happens. The computer allows me to have, right away, a sonic idea of the result, much faster than I would have on paper or on the piano. And many times, I surprise myself – positively! – with this combination. Obviously, then I have to work on each of the materials to find the exact combination between them, but the point of departure is enabled with the technology. Therefore, I’m not one of those who think that composition needs to be done on paper since the computer makes us reckless and lazy. Every tool offers its potential and the one offered by the computer, curiously, draws written music closer to the electronic one, insofar as the copy-paste and the layering processes are very close to the ones regularly practiced on a digital audio workstation.
· What is the importance of space and timbre in your music? ·
DM: It’s growing, particularly since the moment in which I’ve begun to work with electronic music. It has truly been happening since 2018, since my opera Ninguém & Todo-o-Mundo, in which Óscar Rodrigues, according to my instructions, was responsible for the composition, production and mixing of the electronics. Now in 2020 I’ve deepened it a lot in the context of the piece Isto não é um filme, where I have effectively created the electronics (always with the precious assistance – orientation, I should even say – of Óscar). This doesn’t mean that the timbre and space haven’t already been important aspects in my purely acoustic music (particularly the timbre). There was at least one piece, where I deliberately used the spatial aspect: a recomposition of Bach’s music for 100 flutes, 100 saxophones and 100 clarinets, where the gigantic instrumental mass was spread over different parts of the concert hall. Yet, curiously, before “discovering” the electronics I’d comprehend music, above all, in terms of harmony and form, not so much in terms of timbre; at least not directly. Since I’ve started working more seriously with the electronics the timbre has become much more central – even in instrumental writing. A great part of work with the electronics actually concerns the sound itself: moulding the timbre in a very conscious and deliberate way. Moreover, the electroacoustic medium provides us with timbral representations and transformations, whereas the traditional notation mainly represents notes and durations. Yet the timbre isn’t only an objective aspect, which can be represented on a spectrogram or transformed with a filter, distortion or reverb. It’s also a profoundly subjective dimension of music, connected with affects and moods. From this point of view, I’ve already worked indirectly with the timbre for a long time, since this emotionally characterised aspect of music is something which has always interested me (together with harmony and form). Although now it’s more and more consciously joined with the timbre.
· Which works in your catalogue do you consider to be turning points? ·
DM: There are various. It’s interesting that normally I change slowly and gradually, and perhaps there are some aspects in my music that are always present. Nevertheless, at the same time if one compares what I do now with what I was doing in 2015 or in 2010, I think that there are a lot of differences. Among these turning points I would point out: Introspections (2006), a piece for septet, the first one composed as ESMAE student, with lots of influences of spectral music; the Trio (2010) for flute, clarinet and piano, where for the first time I adopted a more consonant and diatonic language; the Sextet (2013), the first piece composed in London, with a more transparent texture and a discourse that is more fragmented than in any other previous piece; Desconcerto do Mundo (2016), a piece for ensemble and amateur choirs, where for the first time I introduced a humoristic element and an explicit reference to popular music; Ninguém & Todo-o-Mundo (2018), an opera around Gil Vicente, in which, apart from using electronics for the first time, I make a very conscious use of quotations and references, something that presently interests me a lot; Isto não é um filme (2020), a recently premiered concerto for orchestra and electronics, in which I go even deeper when it comes to working with electronics and I get closer, more explicitly, to certain cinematic forms of music (and sound design).
· In what way composition and performance are, for you, complementary activities? ·
DM: Today I think that it’s a pity that I didn’t follow a performance career, as these two activities can be mutually enriching. I think that an ideal model is a composer who’s also a performer. In my case, I’ve ended up developing another complementarity: between composition and theory/ analysis. I like saying that I’m a composer in 55% and a theoretician/ annalist in 45%. They are two very different fields, and I need to assume a different mindset whether I practice one or the other. However, at the same time, I’m always the same person and for this reason these two activities influence each other.
Part 4 · Portuguese Music
· What in your opinion distinguishes Portuguese music at an international level? ·
DM: It’s very difficult to clearly answer this question, even in the contemporary “classical” area, which is the one that I know better (it would be even more difficult to give an answer concerning jazz, pop-rock or traditional music, …). In any case, I think that as far as “classical” music goes we’re presently very far from the late 19th century and early 20th century nationalist schools – and rightly so! That is, I don’t necessarily see any aspect that would decisively mark a difference between Portuguese and foreign music. Different composers have different references, ones being more connected with French composers, others to the German ones, still others with the English or American. And each of these countries has also a complex scenario. It’s certain that there are common places – for example, that the French valorise microtonality more than the English. Yet I don’t know up to which point is it adequate to make these generalisations.
Part 5 · Present & Future
· What are you present and future projects? ·
DM: I’ve just premiered a piece for orchestra and electronics, which has had a great impact on my work. In the near future I thus want to develop a series of mixed music projects, but now focusing on chamber music. I would like to record and release an album with this music.
· How do you see the future of art music? ·
DM: I won’t try to do futurology. Therefore, what I can say is more what I would like to happen than what I think will necessarily take place. What I would fundamentally like is that the many prevailing arbitrary boarders between different music genres are blurred. For example, jazz is a very rich, extremely sophisticated and varied universe, yet it’s still far away from the education of “classical” music composers and performers. Without any doubt this is still a remnant (among other factors) of an institutional depreciation of jazz due to its predominantly black origins. Likewise, what we call pop-rock is not a mantle of platitudes or second-rate music as often we are used to say within the “classical” music field, but an extremely diversified area which includes – apart from a lot of rubbish, obviously – highly sophisticated approaches towards aspects such as timbre and rhythm. And, frankly speaking, a lot of the best electronic music that I have heard comes from the cinema, where the border between music and sound design has been increasingly blurred. It’s a mistake – and arrogance – to assume that art music only exists within what we call “classical music”. Then, I’m not defending a fusion or lack of differentiation between these genres. Whether one likes it or not, my education, for example – my roots – are mainly in the framework of “classical” music. And everyone has his or her own roots and education. However, the different fields need to have more dialogue, without necessarily losing their autonomy. I think that it can work only to their mutual advantage.
Daniel Moreira, October 2020
© MIC.PT
