Baile de Palillos na Amazônia: quando o bailaor se torna músico

Abstract

This research focuses primarily on the performance experience – danced-played gestures – of the bailaores-tocaores of Palillos (castanets) in dances held by the Companhia Flamenca do Pará in the Brazilian Amazon. The study aimed to analyze the expressive forms (uses, touches, and modes of transmission) of this musical instrument, which has been in existence for over three thousand years, based on the experiential accounts of the bailaores-tocaores who participate in the Bailes por Sevillanas held weekly during the Flamenco classes of the Company. The Dissertation will address, in the following order: the historical context of dances in Belém, since their arrival; the musical characteristics (and examples) of bailes with Palillos; the history of the use of castanets (from the most primitive to contemporary forms); aspects of Crotalogía or the Science of Castanets; and, finally, the description of a baile of Palillos in the context of a Flamenco class, with its various ethnocoreomusicological relevance: castanet playing techniques, the relationship between hand and foot percussion; specifics of the dancer-musician gesture of the bailaor-tocaor; transmission modes etc. One of the most significant findings of this research is how the performance of the bailaores-tocaores is particularized in the dancing bodies of the Amazonian region, producing unique processes of subjectivation. Finally, for the analysis of the data collected in the field, we will employ the theoretical frameworks of Jose de Udaeta (1989), author of La Castañuela Española: origen y evolución; Joaquín Díaz (1994), author of La Castañuela Tradicional and director of the Ethnographic Center of Valladolid, Spain; and Francisco Agustin Florencio, creator of the Ciencia de las Castañuelas or Crotalogía.