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PUMA for wind quintet
The puma is one of the largest and strongest felines native to the Americas. It was a powerful symbol and the object of deep veneration for several ancient civilizations of South America, among them the Moche and the Inca. In fact, Inca admiration for the feline was so profound that their capital city, Cusco, was built in the shape of a puma, with the Saksaywaman citadel at its head, the Koricancha temple at its genitals, and a street named Pumakurku ("puma spine") along its back.
It´s quite possible to imagine why this animal deserved such extraordinary reverence. It possesses a beautiful build and great strength; its amazing speed and precision of movement make it a flawless hunter. It is also a solitary animal, which is interesting from an emotional and/or literary perspective, and makes it all the more enigmatic as a character.
I found this combination of qualities - great strength, stunning skill and a predilection for solitude - quite intriguing. Guided by these aspects, and inspired by Moche and Inca depictions of the animal, I started to explore the ritual figure of the puma through music. This work was the result.
“As always, Cueto’s music gives the listener a Peruvian taste full of personality in its beautiful melodic lines, interesting harmonies and strong rhythm which won’t leave anyone indifferent. It’s both a delight to listen to and fun to play. I highly recommend this piece for any ambitious wind quintet”
KIPU for chamber ensemble
There are many clues that point to an ancient communication between South America and China. The Chilean investigator Jaime Errázuriz, for example, gathered a list of 89 towns and cities in Peru whose names have a meaning in Chinese. Peru and China also have 118 locations with the same name. Could this be just a coincidence?
The kipu is a system of recording information used in pre-Hispanic America. It consists of several hanging threads that bear knots of different colors and sizes, placed at different heights and distances. The oldest known kipus were found at Caral (Peru), a site believed to be 5000 years old.
Alexander von Humboldt was one of the first to associate the Andean kipu with very similar devices found in China. Gustavo Vargas, in his book “Fusang: Chinos en América antes de Colón”, corroborates this claim and goes on to share their Chinese name: “qi pui”.
If these two peoples really did come into contact... what sort of relationship did they have? How did they view one another? What principles or ideas guided their exchange? These are the questions that led me to write this piece. It is my own musical hypothesis; a "fantasy" on a long voyage leading to an encounter between two distant civilizations. Might a similar story lie hidden in a kipu we can´t yet read? Until scientists finally figure out how to decode the complex, colorful knots, their message will continue to be as abstract as music itself.
“A piece that emanates energy. The composer finds a way to make it shine in a simple and elegant way”
LUNA for violin, saxophone and piano
LUNA was written for the A-Trio, an ensemble of Russian musicians living in Germany. Back in 2015, while reading the news, I came across something that peaked my interest: the Russian Space Corporation (Роскосмос) had announced a plan to establish a permanent human colony on the Moon by the year 2030. Several other nations - including Japan, China and the USA - had announced similar projects over the years.
I began to think about this idea, and its possible implications for human culture. An intriguing question came to mind: if a human settlement on the Moon is developed, would works of art be created there? What would the music made by inhabitants of such remote colonies sound like, especially as they start to call the Moon their permanent home?
I started to imagine a music that combined well-known elements of the Western tradition with new patterns and concepts, these being an expression of the profoundly different daily-life experiences of living on the Moon. I heard, in my mind, a lonesome song, performed with a view of a lunar night sky. Later in the piece, a strange pulsating music, maybe a subtle depiction of a process of lunar tectonics. Connecting between these two musical moments, a third idea: a weightless, oscillating motive, perpetually shifting back and forth between two harmonies; swaying, gently and forever, eventually getting lost into a cosmic silence…
From these imagined scenarios, a primitive “sketch” started to emerge; a voyage into an unexplored compositional region. LUNA, for me, became a musical fantasy about a distant - yet still human - reality.
LAS ANTARAS DE CELSO for double bass
“Das Stück stellt in einer Art Meditation einen Kontrast zwischen dem bekannten tiefen Bassklang und Flageolett-Tönen her, welche auf dem Kontrabass tatsächlich stark an die Panflöten der Anden erinnern.”
CUARTETOS CRIOLLOS for clarinet quartet
“Listening to my students’ performance of the Cuartetos Criollos by Daniel Cueto, I admire the effect that the work had on the audience and on the performers. The music was also highly praised by the professors, and the students were very motivated by the work’s Latin American rhythms and gestures. Even know the performers were from very diverse backgrounds, they became so intensely united -particularly in the last movement- in creating that warm and inspired “Peruvian song””