The Unabridged Interview:
          Early Music America Magazine

by Christopher Moroney

The name of our group is SAVAE, or the San Antonio Vocal Arts Ensemble. We started using the acronym SAVAE among ourselves because it was quicker and easier to say. We usually use both versions of the name on concert programs, CDs, etc. and we gladly answer to either.

The group was formed in 1989 to present chamber vocal works from the Middle Ages and Renaissance. Although we started out as an a cappella ensemble, we gradually began to add instrumental accompaniment. Because the seven singers in the group are also instrumentalists, this was an easy and natural progression. Our members' diverse musical interests and backgrounds have also broadened our repertoire to encompass quite a wide range of musical styles and time periods.

Since the group's inception, an area of particular focus has been the music of Latin America from the Spanish colonial period. SAVAE's home base is, of course, San Antonio, a city that is steeped in Hispanic culture and history, and that, combined with our interest in early music has naturally led us to explore this repertoire.

We do the most musical constructing, or reconstructing, in our 16th and 17th century Mexican music programs, "Guadalupe, Virgen de los Indios" and "El Milagro de Guadalupe".

In the process of researching the music for the Guadalupe programs, it became clear that in the early part of the Spanish colonial epoch in Mexico a hybrid form of music was being created and performed. This was a result of the cross-cultural interaction between the Spaniards and Mexicans.

Not only were indigenous Mexicans writing polyphonic motets and masses as early as the 1530s, they were adding European instruments such as recorder, harp, cornett, and bassoon to their traditional teponaztli (a two-keyed log drum), huehuetl (three legged cylindrical drum), ayacaxtli (gourd rattle), and tlapitzalli (vertical flute) ensembles. On the other side of the coin, Spanish and Portuguese chapel masters were incorporating Mexican tribal languages and rhythms into their own compositions. This was a unique period of experimentation which was stimulated by an enthusiastic interest in European music on the part of the Mexicans and the use of music as an aid in the process of conversion on the part of the Spanish missionaries.

Villancicos, polyphonic music in four parts, masses, and other liturgical works were being composed by the Mexicans with such skill that Spanish masters of composition deemed them to be superior works of art and could not believe they had been written by "Indians." This period seems to have reached its peak by the mid to late 16th century, and from all accounts the music that was created and performed during this time was fascinating, even amazing, to those who heard it.

Unfortunately, there are very few pieces written by native composers that have survived from this time. What SAVAE had to work with were two musical entreaties to the Virgin Mary ("Dios itlazo nanztine" and "In ilhuicac cihuapille) by the Aztec noble, Don Hernando Franco, and about 20 pieces written for use in the early Mesoamerican Catholic church by Tomás Pascual, a Mayan chapel master from northwestern Guatemala (part of the Aztec empire at the time of the Spaniards' arrival). All of this music is vocal, without any indication of instrumental parts. However, written accounts by eyewitness chroniclers from the period repeatedly describe indigenous choirs singing polyphonic and antiphonal music while accompanying themselves on flutes, bells, drums, and other instruments.

Frequent mention is made of the rhythmic ingenuity of Aztec singing and dancing, which was always accompanied by the teponaztli, huehuetl, ayacaxtli, and tlapitzalli.

It is obvious from reading through the pieces that most of the music has a rhythmic, dance-like quality (the notable exceptions are the European style motets and fabordón settings by Tomás Pascual). To give this music its just due in terms of historic performance, the addition of period instruments and percussion is not only desirable but, I think, necessary. It was not difficult for SAVAE to decide which instruments to use—written accounts and paintings from the period provide ample description. The more difficult issues were: where do we find these instruments and how were they played in the 1500s? What was the singing style of the Mexicans--was their vocal sound different from the Europeans'? What did Classical Nahuatl (the Aztec language used in many of the pieces) sound like in the 16th century? And finally, what were the rhythms of the Aztecs which so fascinated the Spaniards?

Fortunately for SAVAE, San Antonio is a city so closely associated with Mexico that we were able to find many of the instruments we needed right here at El Mercado, a Mexican market in the downtown area. In addition, the border towns of Nuevo Laredo and Ciudad Acuña are just a 3-hour drive from here. We aqcuired a variety of huilacapitzli and tlapitzalli (clay ocarinas and flutes), ayacaxtli (gourd rattles), ayoyotes (seed or nut shell rattles), chicahuatzli (rain sticks), and coyolli (jingles made of various substances) all within the area.

I collected pitched stones, or lajas, from a dry stream bed near my house. We were able to use a modern version of a huehuetl which was built by my wife's sister and her husband. Our producer, Ben Tavera King, loaned us a slit drum (the modern version of a teponaztli) to work with. We eventually purchased an authentic Mexican reproduction of a teponaztli at the Music Inn in Greenwich Village. Our atecocolli (conch shell) came from a luau party supply company in Hawaii.

To figure out how to perform with all of these instruments we again turned to the written accounts and paintings from the period (invaluable reference books for much of this information are Robert Stevenson's "Music in Aztec and Inca Territory," University of California Press, 1968 and Serge Gruzinski's "Painting the Conquest," Unesco/Flammarion, 1992).

For instance, we learned that the huehuetl was traditionally played with the hands (the use of mallets was a post-Conquest addition), and the teponaztli was played with rubber tipped mallets called olmaitl. In some cases, a formalized sequence of instrumental entrances would be used to start a piece. Certain instruments were used for particular occasions, such as the atecocolli (conch shell), which was played mainly by the priestly class for rituals and special events.

The 16th century paintings of Aztec musicians and instruments not only gave us a visual reference with which to compare our modern reproductions, but also a view of how an ensemble would typically be grouped, the players' stance and approach to their instruments, and their relationship to one another. We used all of this information as an aid in determining how to play the instruments and apply them to the pieces.

Although the paintings didn't offer many clues concerning the vocal sound and style of the Aztec singers, the written records provided some surprising insights. A professional class of musicians existed in Aztec society which controlled public musical life, much like the Levites in ancient Jerusalem. Training for singers was extremely rigid, since music was always used in connection to ritual, and absolutely perfect performances were required and demanded. The Spaniards were amazed at the precision and accuracy of the Aztec singing and dancing--they had never heard or seen anything like it. But there was a powerful motivation behind this precision: an imperfectly executed ritual was thought to offend the gods, and an error in performance carried the death penalty--"tune it or die," as we sometimes like to say. Because of this, great care was taken in tuning, and singers developed an intensely keen and discerning sense of pitch. We've often joked that if the members of SAVAE were held to that kind of rigorous performance code, none of us would be alive at this point.

An analysis of music and dance terms from 16th century Nahuatl dictionaries compiled and written by Spanish missionaries has also provided some general information related to vocal production and style. There are specific words in these dictionaries that describe singing genres and styles, such as "to sing in praise of someone," "to sing derisive songs," "to sing tenderly," or "to sing in a high voice." In pre-Conquest times, public singing was always part of a performance that included dancing and instrumental music. Assertive vocal qualities such as loudness, clarity, and high pitch were preferred, especially for large, outdoor performances. In describing a dance that took place outdoors during a festival, the Spanish Franciscan Toribio de Motolinía observed that when the seven- and eight-year-old sons of the chieftains joined their fathers in the dance, singing simultaneously, their high voices notably improved the effect. He also wrote that bass voices were preferred for ritual performances that took place within the homes or courtyards of nobility, which suggests that with smaller groups in close quarters, high-pitched singing was not considered necessary.

Regarding post-Conquest polyphonic singing in the European style, several eyewitness chroniclers have written about the "weak" or "thin" sound of the Mexicans, and that they did not have voices as "strong" or "sweet" as the Spaniards, resulting in the need for larger choruses to compensate for lack of volume. Despite this, throughout the written records there is consistent praise for the high level of quality and musicianship displayed by the native choirs. Some listeners went so far as to claim that these choirs rivalled those in the royal Spanish court.

Based on all this information, SAVAE was able to arrive at some conclusions regarding our vocal approach to the repertoire. Clearly, accurate pitch, tuning, and rhythmic precision were a must if we wanted to stay in favor with the gods. Additionally, it was decided that the women in our group would emulate the sound of boy sopranos and male altos, since boys were used as singers and there was no indication in either the written or painted records that women were used as singers in musical performances, before or after the Conquest. The men also adopted a light, straight tone to match. This approach was based the comments that the native Mexican sound was "weak" and "thin" when singing polyphony. The fact that these choirs were being compared to the best in the Spanish court seems to imply that the weak, thin (i.e. straight, light?) tone was producing marvelous results. For the pieces that have their origin in pre-Conquest times, we adopted a more assertive, brazen singing style.

Since many of the texts to the pieces in our Guadalupe programs were written in Classical Nahuatl, it became essential to learn how it was pronounced if we were to give an historically credible performance. Most of the texts required translations as well, so a mini crash course in Nahuatl had to be undertaken. Classical Nahuatl was the court speech of the noblility at the time of the Conquest, and it is no longer in use today. In fact, it is a rare occurrence to meet a fluent Nahuatl speaker, as the language is only used in scattered rural communities throughout Mexico.

Fortunately, as I mentioned earlier, a number of Nahuatl dictionaries were produced by Spanish lexicographers in the 16th century, and these have been invaluable source books for Nahuatl linguistic studies for over four centuries. SAVAE's pronunciation is based on the Nahuatl-Spanish dictionary of Fray Alonso de Molina, published in Mexico City in 1571, the Nahuatl-French dictionary of Rémi Simón, published in Paris in 1885, and the research work of contemporary Nahuatl linguistic authorities, J. Richard Andrews, John Bierhorst, and Frances Karttunen. We used Karttunen's "An Analytical Dictionary of Nahuatl" (University of Texas Press, Austin, 1983; University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 1992) extensively to create our translations and Andrews' "Introduction to Classical Nahuatl" (University of Texas Press, Austin, 1975) to create our phonetic transcriptions.

It was pretty painstaking work, but well worth it, as it gave us the ability to give the words we were singing and speaking the appropriate tone, stress, and emotion. Positve confirmation of this came after a "try-out" concert of the material in San Antonio during its early stages of development.

After the performance, a man in his mid-forties came up to me and began speaking very enthusiastly in a language that sounded something like Spanish but clearly wasn't, as I couldn't catch a single word of it. He realized that I didn't understand what he was saying, so he spoke to me in English and explained that his parents were from Mexico and he had grown up speaking Nahuatl. When I asked him if our Nahuatl pronunciation was understandable he smiled broadly and said, "Oh yes! Every word, perfectly!" That was a great relief. Molina, Simón, Andrews, Bierhorst, and Karttunen deserve many thanks.

The Aztec rhythms are an integral element of our performance and add tremendously to the music itself. In many cases, a piece that on its own is rather ordinary becomes transformed into something extraordinary because of its interplay with these rhythms. Initially, our use of percussion followed the meter and melodic rhythm of the song we were applying it to. This yielded some interesting results, mainly because the sounds of the Aztec instruments were so exotic and evocative. It seemed to be a safe tack, given we had no idea what the Aztec rhythms sounded like historically. However, the effect never measured up to the enthusiastic descriptions offered by the Spanish chroniclers. Things didn't really begin to click until we learned about the "Cantares Mexicanos" in the course of our research.

The 16th century codex, "Cantares Mexicanos," is a collection of pre- and post-Conquest Aztec songs. Ninety-one songs were compiled between 1550 and 1580 by a group of indigenous Mexican musicians and historians under the supervision of Bernardino de Sahagún, a Franciscan missionary who spent much of his career recording native customs and beliefs. Although no written music exists for any of the songs in the "Cantares," there are drum patterns notated in the form of onomatopoeic Nahua syllables which are dispersed throughout the codex.

The notation is essentially made up of four different syllables--ti, qui, to, and co--with typical groupings like: toto tiquiti tiquiti, or tocotico tocoti. Ethnomusicologists have theorized that these syllables not only indicate rhythmic patterns but also pitch--the syllables with an 'i' vowel being higher pitched and the syllables with an 'o' vowel being lower pitched. In addition, the natural stress of these patterns seems to be placed on the syllables with the 't' consonant and the unstress on the syllables with the 'q' or 'c' consonant.

These patterns are easily applied to the huehuetl, where two pitches can be obtained by striking the rim and center of the drum head. The teponaztli, with its two, differently pitched keys cut laterally into the wood of a hollowed-out log, is perfectly designed for this. Additional pitches can be obtained on the teponaztli by striking the sides of it. If more than one teponaztli is used, each of the four syllables can be given a different pitch, creating rhythmic "melodies" from these patterns. With a wide range of drumbeat patterns to choose from (758 of them have been counted in the "Cantares"), a variety of rhythmic and tonal colors can be produced.

It was not really a difficult process to match the drum patterns to the songs--they fit together in a natural way. Nothing needed to be forced or reworked to make the rhythms support the music. In some instances, the drum patterns virtually mirrored the melodic rhythm of the songs to which they were being appled. In other cases, a pattern was chosen that was quite different than the melodic rhythm, providing a rhythmic counterpoint. I think the results were unlike anything we could have imagined had we been left to our own devices. The rhythms give the music a formal, ceremonious quality without sounding stiff or solemn. On the contrary, the effect is very fresh and full of spirit.

The "Cantares" drum patterns also provided the key for reconstructing one of the songs in the codex itself. Song number 44 of the collection, "Teponazcuicatl" (literally, "Log-drum song") is sometimes known by the Spanish name "Pregón del atabal," or "Procession of the drum." The song is divided into two sections—Canto A and Canto B. Canto A recounts some of the history related to the legendary Mexican god-king, Topiltzin Quetzalcóatl, lamenting his departure from the earth and hoping for his messianic return. The spirits of the Toltec ancestors are called forth and asked to transform Mexico into a paradise on earth. In Canto B, the Toltec spirits appear in response to this request. This second section contains references to corn, a painted image, flowers, a bishop (obispoya) issuing proclamations near the water, and a divine mother who is identified by the name Santa Maria.

Canto B clearly shows a Christian influence that is not evident in Canto A (although a parallel can be drawn between Quetzalcóatl and Jesus Christ). It has been conjectured that Canto B originally existed in some earlier form and was reworked by the Aztecs to celebrate the apparitions of the Virgin of Guadalupe to the Nahua Indian Juan Diego in December of 1531. Some have suggested that the painted image in the song refers to the miraculous image of the Virgin which was painted on Juan Diego’s cloak, or tilma, by the flowers which she had wrapped inside of it; that the bishop of the song refers to Bishop Zumarrága, to whom Juan Diego presented his cloak as proof of the Virgin’s appearance; and that the water refers to Lake Texcoco, which at that time surrounded Tenochtitlan (Mexico City) and formed the shoreline adjacent to the hillside of Tepeyac, where the apparitions occurred.

If a pre-Conquest version of Canto B did indeed exist, because of its references to corn, the divine mother of the song would most likely have been Xilónen (the goddess of the Xilotes, the tender ears of corn). Xilónen was another name, or aspect, of the goddess Cihuacóatl, who was often paired with Quetzalcóatl as a representation of the dual principal which is the source of life and all things. According to Sahagún, Cihuacóatl was also called Tonantzin, a name which means “Our Mother.” The site where Tonantzin was worshipped was Tepeyac Hill, the same location where Guadalupe appeared to Juan Diego, thus explaining the connection the Aztecs may have made between Canto B of "Teponazcuicatl" and the Guadalupe apparitions. According to tradition, on December 26, 1531, a triumphant procession accompanied by Canto B of “Teponazcuicatl” conveyed the sacred image on Juan Diego’s tilma from the Mexico City Cathedral along a causeway crossing Lake Texcoco to its newly built shrine at Tepeyac.

The major stumbling block to performing “Teponazcuicatl” for SAVAE was, of course, that no written music exists for it and no rhythmic structure or rhyming scheme is evident in the Nahuatl verses. However, a drum pattern --tico toco toco tiquitiquiti quiti quito--starts Canto B followed by the instruction: “Just thus it will come back in.” By assigning pitches from the pentatonic scale of the Aztec huilacapitzli (clay ocarinas) to these syllables as well as adapting the syllabic pattern to the drums, a driving melodic and rhythmic figure emerged. Not only did the Nahuatl words match the melody beautifully, but each verse neatly fit into a set of four melodic repetitions. One of the most fascinating results of this reconstruction was the appearance of an unmistakable rhyming pattern that occurred at the end of nearly all the melodic repetitions.

I guess I would characterize the process as "creative decoding." The drum pattern served as the rhythmic and melodic decoding key, but from that point we were on our own concerning instrumentation, voicing, tempo, and interpretive style. All of our choices were based on research and the information that was available to us. The reconstruction of "Teponazcuicatl" certainly sounds worlds apart from the post-Conquest polyphonic pieces that we perform, but it would be impossible to call it authentic Aztec music. There are elements that could be said to be authentic--the drum pattern, the words themselves, the sound of some of the instruments--but even those elements can be interpreted or produced in some other way. By the same token, our performances of the post-Conquest pieces can't be labeled authentic either. Short of time travel, there is no way we'll ever know what the original performances sounded like.

SAVAE is currently working on two early music projects that involve constructing repertoire using a research process similar to the one described above. The first is a commission from the Mint Museum of Art in Charlotte, North Carolina to create and perform another musical reconstruction from the "Cantares Mexicanos." The museum is producing an exhibit about the Aztec ball game courts and Xochipilli/Macuilxochitl, the god of games, dancing, and music. For the opening of the exhibit in November 2001, the curator of Pre-Columbian and African Art has asked us to perform song 65, "Mataltzincayotl," in which Macuilxochitl appears as the supreme spirit.

The other project is a reconstruction of music from Palestine in the first century C.E. The same method of research that was used for the Guadalupe programs is being used for this one: a thorough study of the society, culture, and religion; reliance on eyewitness written accounts of musical performances (believe it or not, some actually exist!); collecting copies of written musical fragments that have survived; finding reproductions of musical instruments that were used during the period and learning how to play them; studying the ancient languages used in the area during the first century (Aramaic, Greek, and Hebrew). We are also using folk music traditions from the Near and Middle East as a model.

Both of these projects are rich and rewarding endeavors because they involve so much more than just the study of music. They include within them the study of a past culture's society, theology, mythology, politics, economy, philosophy, and science. It's fascinating, enlightening, sometimes unsettling, and sometimes downright mind-blowing. And the end result, if it is successful, transmits all of that information into and through an art form that is alive with emotion, sound, and vibration: music.

It's amazing when you think about it. If an audience experiences that kind of transmission, the early music performance is, I think, authentic in its own right.

A number of SAVAE's arrangements of colonial Latin American repertoire have been published by World Library Publications (WLP). They include both vocal and instrumental parts, translations, phonetic transcriptions, historic background on the composers and culture, and a description of the instruments and how they are played. WLP's address and phone is:

World Library Publications
3825 N. Willow Road
Schiller Park, IL 60176-9936
800-621-5197