Performed at the Basel Composition Competition on January 30th, 2025, at Don Bosco Basel by the Kammerorchester Basel, conducted by Tito Ceccherini.
Macabre Carnival stands as an act of reimagination of the intricate Mexican ritual, both funerary and festive, acknowledging memory, transience, and permanence. My interest in the subject arises from the impressions evoked by the novel Under the Volcano by English author Malcolm Lowry. This practice, rich in anthropological significance, seeks to preserve the memory of those who have departed through its inherent contradiction between solemn remembrance and exuberant commemoration.
The framework of the piece moves precisely between the tension that arises from the funereal, gloomy, or tragic, and the grotesque that emerges from revelry and irony, turning mourning into an ambivalent act, as if opening a portal between the earthly world and that of the netherworld.
