Cantos Cautivos
176 results where found for «Song of the Seed and the Plant»
Song of the Seed and the Plant (Canción de la semilla y la planta)
- Music piece by:Sergio Vesely
- Testimony by:Sergio Vesely
- Experience in:
- Tags:
- « The history of the seed and the plant, of which this song forms part, was performed as a play to entertain our audience of children during a family visit to the prison. Imagination had no limits when it came to kindling a small flame of hope in our hearts. »
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- Music piece by:Julio Iglesias
- Testimony by:César Montiel
- Experience in:Colonia Dignidad, April 1975
- Tags:
- « At the beginning of the 1970s, I met Carmen, my comrade, my love, at the Juventudes Comunistas of Talca. We had the life of young idealists, sharing our everyday, living this revolutionary process so beautifully. »
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- « That's the curious thing, to this day we wonder how they knew that song was our song, the song of our love. None of the guards asked us what music we liked. I would ask myself: How did they know that ‘A flor de piel’ was our song? Which of my cell comrades knew? I felt uncertain and worried that they knew this and how much information they could access. »
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- Music piece by:Julio Iglesias
- Testimony by:Carmen Espinoza Alegría
- Experience in:Colonia Dignidad, April 1975
- Tags:
- « I’m from Talca. I met César, my comrade, my love, in 1971 or 1972, approximately. We were young idealists, we were members of Juventudes Comunistas, and were student leaders in our secondary schools. »
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- « One day, one of the guards came to me and whispered the song
‘A flor de piel’ (Under my Skin) byJulio Iglesias . This song was very significant for me because it was the song César and I listened to when we were dating. »- [Read full testimony]
- Music piece by:José Agustín Goytisolo (lyrics) and Paco Ibáñez (music)
- Testimony by:Amelia Negrón
- Experience in:Campamento de Prisioneros, Tres Álamos, 1975 and 1976, until the closure of Tres Álamos
- Tags:
- « There were so many of us women prisoners. Despite the circumstances, we had managed to invent our own world, one with our rules, according to what we thought and wanted for ourselves, our families and all the Chilean people. »
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- « Introduction by Ana María Jiménez: 'We are going to sing a song that for us, former prisoners, has great significance. This is 'Palabras para Julia,' a song with lyrics by José Agustín Goytisolo and music by Paco Ibáñez. It speaks of strength, love, resistance, and it became the anthem of the women of Tres Álamos. With it, we greeted those who arrived and said goodbye to those who were freed. With it, we remember and want to share it with you today.' »
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- Music piece by:All the women present at that moment in Chacabuco
- Testimony by:Mónica García Cuadra
- Experience in:Campamento de Prisioneros Chacabuco, Summer of 1974
- Tags:
- « I am the daughter of a former political prisoner who spent a long time imprisoned at Chacabuco, among other places. I am Monica, a little 9-year-old girl who travelled with a heavy heart full of sadness to visit her father, Gerardo García Salas, held at the Chacabuco concentration camp. I am an only child and in my young life, he is my sole reference point and, in essence, my image of masculinity. »
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- « That song had been written and was in every mind, subtly flooding that arid time and space we were experiencing with loving melodies of struggle. It is the most suffering, most painful, true, symbolic and freedom-loving song I have ever heard in the vast and implacable silence. »
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- Music piece by:Félix Luna (lyrics) and Ariel Ramírez (music). Popularised by Mercedes Sosa.
- Testimony by:Sergio Vesely
- Experience in:Villa Grimaldi, January 1975
- Tags:
- « It was not easy to endure being locked up in one of Villa Grimaldi’s miserable cells, which resembled vertical coffins. It was even harder in the high temperatures of the summer months of the Andes foothills in Peñalolén. I was inside one of those cells, blindfolded, my feet and hands in chains. »
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- « I mustered enough courage to sing the beautiful verses of this song a second time. The song was written as a tribute to a poet who killed herself in the sea. To my surprise, the guard let me sing the entire song without interrupting or beating me. And all my tortured comrades could hear my voice in the silence of their own cells. »
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- Music piece by:René “Popeye” Cárdenas Eugenin
- Testimony by:María Soledad Ruiz Ovando
- Experience in:Campamento de Prisioneros Isla Dawson, 1973 - 1974
- Tags:
- « Music was very important for us (my mother Sylvia, my sister Alejandra and myself) while my dad, Daniel Ruiz Oyarzo, 'el Negro Ruiz', was imprisoned during the dictatorship, when Alejandra was seven and I was four. »
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- « Daniel died in 2006 and the same year, five months later, his granddaughter Ayelén was born. She, needless to say, also knows and sings the song. She was four when we visited Uncle Popeye at home and she sang the song to him. »
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- Music piece by:Violeta Parra
- Testimony by:Gabriela Durand
- Experience in:
- Tags:
- « I was 18, and already I had been tortured on the
parrilla several times. One day I was with some other comrade prisoners, and as sometimes happened, the guards put some music on. »- [...]
- « I was sitting down, handcuffed, and at some point, the song 'Volver a los diecisiete' ('To Be Seventeen Again') came on; I don’t know if it was the radio or a record being played. A guard came up to me, pulled me up and said: 'Look, girl, listen to this song, it’s yours, you revolutionaries; let’s see, sing it!' I told him I couldn’t sing and he said 'Yes you can - sing to your comrades, they’re all feeling screwed'. »
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- Music piece by:original by Friedrich von Schiller (lyrics) and Ludwig van Beethoven (music). Free version in Spanish by Amado Regueiro Rodríguez, aka Orbe (lyrics) y Waldo de los Ríos (music), popularised in Chile by Miguel Ríos.
- Testimony by:Amelia Negrón
- Experience in:Campamento de Prisioneros, Tres Álamos, 31 December 1975
- Tags:
- « Preparations for that Wednesday night became more intense. It would be a different night. We women prisoners had secretly organised ourselves, but more importantly, we had also coordinated with the male prisoners. »
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- « We sang and sang: 'Ode to Joy', 'El negro José', 'Palabras para Julia', 'No volveré', and we kept singing and singing. We would start singing a song and the men, fellow prisoners on the other side, beyond the walls that separated us, would respond. That night we went to bed around one in the morning, exhausted and hoarse but so happy. We had broken the chains - it was still possible to think of freedom. »
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- Music piece by:Víctor Jara
- Testimony by:Alfonso Padilla Silva
- Experience in:Campamento Prisioneros Estadio Regional, 25 December 1973
- Tags:
- « During Christmas 1973, I was one of some 600 men and 100 women prisoners in Concepción Regional Stadium. »
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- « Although strictly speaking, the song did not have a social or political message as such, to sing a song by Jara was tantamount to a tribute to him and to his example, and also to all the fallen comrades. »
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- « I was 18, and already I had been tortured on the