Instrumentation: Oboe Duration: 5 mins.
Program Notes:
Ever since I first read Julia de Burgos’ evocative, thought-provoking, vivid poetry, her words have deeply inspired many ways of conceptualizing music, text and my personal point of view. Her work shows her most intimate thoughts, feelings and desires. She yearned to be her own true self in a world that wanted to shape her into what others wanted her to be, say and do.
In 1938, at 24 years old she published her first collection of poems: Poema en Veinte Surcos (Poem in Twenty Furrows). This collection comprised what would later have considered her best and most renowned works and a testament to the unique voice she carried in her generation. Her oeuvre opened the paths for new voices that wanted to reconsider their own identities, beyond Puerto Rico’s colonialist past, present and future.
Momentos, is the fifth poem from said collection and it not only serves as a testament to Julia’s incredible word-craft, but also lets loose her most honest thoughts regarding a search of purpose, fulfillment and self that I believe we all might identify with.
Julio Elvin Quiñones | Composer 