Two Neruda Poems

1971

12 minutes 45 seconds

Mezzo-soprano and piano

Pablo Neruda

December 1, 1971, Bennington College, Bennington, Vermont, Jan DeGaetani, soprano and Vivian Fine, piano

Available on demo CD

1. La Tortuga (The Turtle)
2. Oda al Piano (Ode to the Piano)

“The Neruda songs made a delicious pair, ‘La tortuga’ crawling along in hushed beauty and ‘Oda al piano’ closing the concert with a witty microdrama.”

–Donal Henahan, The New York Times, April 17, 1973

 

“The two songs formed a stark contrast. ‘The Turtle’ is a gravely contemplative work, rich in magical stillness—and curiously tragic. But the second song, ‘Ode to the Piano,’ is a wild burlesque-illustration of the poem’s inside jokes. (Neruda pictures the piano as a ‘catafalque,’ with its teeth on the wrong side of its mouth—a mouth with ‘the jaws of leviathan.’) During all this, the piano soars and glides along, sometimes quoting bits of Romantic repertory—a snippet of Chopin Etude, for instance—practically ignoring the singer. As the ode concluded, [the singer] turned, lowered the open top; turned around, took the music off and closed the music rack (with Fine still playing), and eventually closed the keyboard lid. In effect, this is a song for piano, accompanied by a singer.

–Heuwell Tircuit, San Francisco Chronicle, January 11, 1983

 

“Best of all, in a way, was the final offering, two Pablo Neruda poems set to music by Vivian Fine. ‘La Tortuga’ was slow, low-placed, imaginative in its sonic pictorialization and beautifully timed and structured to reveal the philosophical implications of a poem describing a tortoise finally transcending his long life and joining ‘the other boulders.’
‘Oda al piano’ was witty, stylish and dramatic in the playfulness with which both Neruda and Fine describe a surreal piano concert, ending with Friedman putting down her music, closing the piano lid finally closing the keyboard and walking off. Fine’s settings are resourceful but more than merely that, her music is both amusing and very serious, and these songs should enter the active repertory.

–Charles Shere, Oakland Tribune, October 27, 1981

La Tortuga

La tortuga que	The turtle
anduvo	toiling forward
tanto tiempo	so long,
y tanto vió	having seen so much
con	with
sus	his
antiguos	antediluvian
ojos,	eyes
la tortuga	the turtle
que comió	munching
aceitunas	olives
del más profundo	where the ocean is
mar,	deepest:
la tortuga que nadó	the turtle that swam
siete siglos	seven centuries
y conoció	and know
siete	seven
mil	millennial
primaveras,	springs:
la tortuga	the turtle
blindada	hooded
contra	against
el calor	hot
y el frío,	and cold,
contra	against
los rayos y las olas,	comber and glitter:
la tortuga	the yellowing
amarilla	turtle,
y plateada,	plated
con severos	with hard
lunares	moonmarks
ambarinos	of amber
y pies de rapiña,	and the feet of a predator:
la tortuga	the turtle
se quedó	sleeps
aquí	now, having
durmiendo,	come to a halt,
y no lo sabe.	hardly aware of it.
De tan vieja	Patriarch, long
se fue	hardening
poniendo dura,	into his time,
dejó	he grew
de amar las olas	weary of waves
y fue rígida	and stiffened himself
como una plancha de planchar.	like a flatiron.
Cerró	Having dared
los ojos que	so much
tanto	ocean and sky, time and terrain,
mar, cielo, tiempo, y tierra	he let his eyes droop
desafiaron,	and then slept,
y se durmió	a boulder
entre las otras	among other boulders.
piedras.

 

Oda al Piano

Estaba triste el piano en el concierto, olvidado en su frac sepulturero, y luego abrió la boca, su boca de ballena: entró el pianista al piano volando como un cuervo, algo pasó como si cayera una piedra de plata o una mano a un estanque escondido: resbaló la dulzura como la lluvia sobre una compana, cayó la luz al fondo de una casa cerrada, una esmeralda recorrió el abismo y sonó el mar, la noche, las praderas, la gota del rocío, el altísimo trueno, cantó la arquitectura de la rosa, rodó el silencio al leche de la aurora. Así nació la música del piano que moría, subió la vestidura de la náyade del catafalco y de su dentadura hasta que en el olvido cayó el piano, el pianista y el concierto, y todo fue sonido, torrencial elemento, sistema puro, claro campanario. Entonces volvió el hombre del árbol de la música. Bajó volando como cuervo perdido o caballero loco: cerró su boca de ballena el piano y él anduvo hacia atrás, hacia el silencio.

Midway in the concert, the piano grew pensive, ignored in its gravedigger’s frock coat; but later it opened its mouth -- the jaws of leviathan: the pianist then entered his piano and deployed like a crow; something happened, like a silvery downfall of pebbles or a hand in a pond, unobserved: a trickle of sweetness like rain on the smooth of a bell, light fell through the padlocks and bolts of a house, to the depths, an emerald crossed the abysses, the sea gave its sound the night and the dews and the meadows, the steepest ascents of the thunderbolt, the symmetrical rose sang aloud and quietness circled the milk of the morning. So melody grew in a dying piano, the naiad’s investiture rose on the catafalque from a margin of teeth, piano, pianist, and concerto plunged downward, oblivious, till all was sonority, torrential beginnings, consummate gradation, a bell tower’s clarities. Then the man in the tree of his music came back to us. He came down like a blundering crow on its course or a lunatic dandy: the whale-mouth closed up and the man walked away to a silence.

Translated by Ben Belitt