Margot

Margot. This came at a very important time--Spring 2011--just before the bottom fell out. Margot (a Landscape grad) was in my Songs & Places class--I think we were doing the international version--and some of the music was from Argentina, which she liked a lot, and wanted to learn--(here with ukelele!)--so she asked if we could do an Independent Study. Margot--an independent type herself (México traveler and surfer and yurt dweller, among other adventures) and of course I said yes. Not that music lessons were my forte, but I appreciated her spirit in asking. And I realized later, that these music sessions together gave me a touchstone for what followed--they were meaningful to  remember.

The song here was probably Pato Sirirí, by Jaime Dávalos, a much-loved Argentine musician (and wonderful story-teller) who came form the province of Salta, almost in the Andes, but had himself fallen in love with the music of the Río Paraná--Chamamé and the Guaraní. Pato Sirirí is in in that tradition. It locates the singer on banks of a river, where the reflection of the creature on the water (pato sirirí - a species of Argentine duck) models the reflection of the Cruz del Sur--the Southern Cross--and the stars reflected on the water guide its flight, just as they guide the inspiration of the singer. It's a wonderful image, a touch complex--but the layering of worlds finds a parallel in the melody.

Margot is in LA now, I've seen pictures of her work, her life, her friends... Seems everything continues just as it should... What one would hope. As in the song, as in the river itself... 

Pato Sirirí.


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