Privado: Ethnomusicology in Cuzco

Schedule

The ethnomusicology course lasts four weeks and will have a total of 180 hours of academic classes—systematizing information—and practical work.

Week 1

Introduction of Peruvian traditional music audiovisual recordings and private collections kept in the Institute of Ethnomusicology and its audiovisual laboratory. The following workshops are offered: History of Peru, Andean Anthropology, Andean Ethnomusicology, Popular and Traditional Music in Lima and Techniques of Audiovisual Recording in the Field Work.

Week 2

Trip to Cuzco. A visit to the institutions that organize Virgen del Carmen Festival in Pisac. This visit will be supplemented with workshops on Andean Rituals and Festivals, and a short ethno-musical or cultural research, on a topic the student is interested in and which is related to the festival to be attended. They will also have the opportunity to learn how to play an Andean musical instrument or dance a traditional dance of the feast in order to participate in one of its ceremonial events.

Week 3

Participation in Virgen del Carmen Festival, where students will have the opportunity to make their audiovisual recordings, interview other participants and observe the cultural practices related to their research topic. For instance, the day before the festivity they will enjoy watching the entrance of the dancing groups, the tipy rooster ritual and the burning of pyrotechnic reed frames known as «castles.» At the early dawn hours of the central day, they will have the opportunity to accompany the Kachampa dancers, who will perform an ancient Andean ritual on a mountain near Pisac. That day, they will also be able to go to a Catholic mass in Quechua (Inca language), take part in a long dancing parade, accompany the festival sponsors, and taste the traditional typical food of the event. In the following days, they will have the opportunity to accompany the presentation of various dances in the town main square and streets, and attend some farewell rites.

Week 4

Back to Lima. Organization, cataloguing and storing of audiovisual material obtained in the field work. Preparation and presentation of the final report on the ethnomusical or cultural research project chosen by the student at the beginning of the course.

Complementary Activities

Workshops are supplemented with a visit to the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology of Peru and the attendance at a Criollo (Peruvian coastal culture) festival in the city of Lima.

In Cuzco students will visit the Museum of Andean and Amazon Traditional Instruments as well as several craft workshops where musical instruments of the region are manufactured.

Upon the end of the feast, students will have two days off to be able to visit Machu Picchu—the old Inca citadel—and several Incas’ Sacred Valley towns; where they will get together with musicians of Andean and mestizo origin, who will perform several music genres of the Southern Andes.