Collective Difference: The Pan-American Association of Composers

Roldán’s use of percussion. 51 According to Carpentier, Varèse studied Roldán’s
techniques of notating Afro-Cuban percussion at the same time he was writing
Ionisation. 52
What might Varèse have known about the characteristic performance techniques
of the Afro-Cuban instruments he included in Ionisation? He had used the güiro in
Arcana (1927), but Ionisation was the first work in which he employed cowbell, bongos,
claves, and maracas. The güiro is introduced in measures 25-30 with one of its most
characteristic rhythms in Afro-Cuban music: long, short, short (Example 1.8a). Notice
that despite Varèse’s note groupings the audible rhythm is still long, short, short. This is a
rhythmic cell that becomes reversed in its next appearance in measure 28, in Example
1.8b. Just to drive home that the rhythm is now short, short, long, the listener hears
“short-short-long, short-short-long, short-short-long-long-long.” This cell is further
developed in the güiro’s solo in measures 35-37 (Example 1.8c). By removing the timbre
of the güiro from its Latin American context and subjecting its characteristic rhythm to
the process of development, Varèse successfully fulfilled Roldán’s desire that the rhythm
of the güiro “not always recall a rumba.”
Example 1.8a. Edgard Varèse, Ionisation m. 26 (long, short, short)
51 Zoila Gomez. Amadeo Roldán, 70.
52 Alejo Carpentier, “Varèse vivant,” (Paris: Le Nouveau Commerce, 1980): 21. These techniques included
using a diamond-shaped note head to signal the performer to strike the center of the drum or an x note head
to strike the edge. While Varèse used x note heads to signify special effects in Ionisation, other composers,
such as Milhaud in his Concerto for Percussion, used x’s also. There is no evidence to suggest that Varèse
borrowed Roldán’s percussion notation techniques.
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