“Willaq Pirqa” and the power of her music: Songwriter talks about the logic behind the songs

Cinema narrates with images, but also with music. The journey of Sistu (Víctor Acurio) in “Willaq Pirqa: the cinema of my town”, a Peruvian film recorded in Quechua that has already been on the billboard for six weeks, would not be what it is without the melodies that accompany it and complement the script, which only goes as far as words and actions allow it. It’s not just about putting a sound track under the dialogue, but those notes say something.

In an interview with El Comercio Karin Zielinski, composer of the film and one of the people with the most experience in this field in Peru with more than 30 musical scores between fictions, documentaries and advertising, tells us about two leit motifs (themes) present in the music of the tape that, as the story progresses, are revealed and complemented by the plot.

“There are two reasons that during the film begin to mix. Sistu is discovering cinema and music is being discovered in some way. This melody represents what he is, a child who belongs to this very particular area of ​​Peru, and who is somehow forgotten.Zielinski says. She refers to the first song of the film that, although it begins sadly, turns into something bright, like her protagonist.

“Then comes the reason when he discovers the cinema, which is like a ladder: I am discovering something, I am going towards something that is making me advance, change. I mean, I’m learning something new. And in the end these two melodies are intertwining”says the composer, and expands on a key point in the film: when the people are not captivated by the cinema and it is Sistu who begins to tell them the stories, when he becomes the true “Willaq Pirqa”.

“When all this part comes, which is like a sequence, in which he begins to tell the people the stories and has all this interaction with Mama Simona (Hermelinda Luján), these two melodies begin to build [algo]. And they mix with the ‘Coca Quintucha’, which is more attributed to Mama Simona. There is this analogy between what it is to read the coca leaf and the ‘talking wall’, so to speak. And for the director it was very important that I use the ‘Coca Quintucha’. And it seemed perfect to me.”Zielinski added.

For the film’s soundtrack, Zielinski says that he turned to Peruvian musicians who are experts in wind, string and percussion instruments. But he also used the Andean violin, which, complemented by a Western violin, speaks of the fusion of two cultures: that of the cinema that comes from outside and that of the community, which has its own stories. There is the work of the musicians who gave sound to the compositions: Rubén Concha (quenas, zampoñas, legüero bass drum, charango and guitar), Andrés Chimango Lares (Andean violin) and María Elena Pacheco (violin).

Composer and musicians set the scene, but also move. They are partly responsible for people leaving the theater crying with this film that talks about cinema, but above all about the stories that unite us. “I think it is a film that connects a lot with the public in some way, even if you are not, specifically, from such a town or you are not from the Andes, I think you still identify with Sistu”, said the composer.