“As a child they told me ‘You play well for a woman’ and I was happy. Today I realize that it is absurd.”

“My grandmother had just passed away and it was a very strong moment because I had to play to a full stadium and all I wanted to do was cry,” says the Peruvian artist about one of the saddest episodes of her life. “They had to put makeup on me four times because I couldn’t stop my tears from falling.”

But everything goes in circles, says the rather trite but accurate saying. A few months after that event, when the COVID-19 pandemic and confinement had already fallen on the world, Giurfa had what is perhaps the happiest memory of him. “I was a little depressed at that time, because many of my plans were cut short. Sometimes I didn’t even get out of my bed. But one day Matt Geraghty called me [productor del proyecto ‘Warrior Women of Afro-Peruvian Music’] and He tells me that we were nominated for the Latin Grammy. It was incredible. I felt happy for myself, but above all for my other teammates,” she remembers.

And this is how Giurfa’s life and career have oscillated. With ups and downs. At some point he went to work in Japan, then he had to return to Lima, and For a few months she has been based in Miami, where she is going through her best moment. She is currently the official drummer for artists such as Gian Marco and the Argentine Diego Torres, and has collaborated on projects with Al Di Meola, Fonseca, Concha Buika and Ara Malikian. Her versatility makes such diverse musicians want to count on her.

First steps

But before devoting herself to music, Gisella Giurfa (Lima, 1988) could have been a gymnast. At her school in Breña – her childhood neighborhood – they told her that due to her flexibility she should go train at the federation. “I was close to doing it, but you had to pay for the training and travel yourself and “We didn’t have money, so it couldn’t be done,” account.

Soon, she realized that what really motivated her was music. She was 5 or 6 years old and “I only knew that making music made me happy.” he assures. There were no musical instruments in his house (that’s why he made noise with pots and ladles), until they brought him a Peruvian cajon.

“With the cajon I began to play or imitate everything that was playing in my house. Whether it was the New Wave that my mother played, or the reggae and metal that my brother listened to, he remembers. Until now, What I like most about the cajon is that when you sit down and play it, you vibrate with it. What you touch you feel in your own body. It’s like an extension of you, and that doesn’t happen with the battery, for example. It is a very personal connection. Because the first instrument that one feels before being born is percussion: the beat of the mother’s heart.”

Now older and more aware of what she wanted, Gisella chose to study at the Conservatory. She chose percussion because she had the wide diversity of instruments – drums, xylophone, vibraphone, marimba, etc. – and so she perfected her skill. Today she is one of the most prominent and sought-after percussionists in our country.

Against everything

Of course, when it started, it was a very different time than now. “We were just two women studying percussion at the time,” she says. And it is that Sitting with your legs open and hitting an instrument with your hands or drumsticks is often mistakenly associated with being masculine.. Something Gisella has had to learn to deal with.

“There has always been the issue of whether [las mujeres] We either do it well enough or we don’t. As if we had to show that we are strong or tough when playing –Giurfa reflects–. In my case, it is not that I have directly suffered rejection, but I have felt, and continue to feel, that they are watching me or judging me. ‘Let’s see how this little girl is going to play’ or the classic comment ‘You play well for a woman’. Even when they told me that as a child, I felt happy. Now I realize that it is absurd. So a woman can’t be on an equal footing with a man? Not even shitting! It is not a gender issue.”

In that sense, Gisella emphasizes the work of those women percussionists from generations before hers: The work of disseminating the cajon of María del Carmen Dongo stands out, who I went to see at her concerts and recorded her with a cassette to learn about her style; or the push of the now deceased Kata Robles, who told her how at the time they didn’t even let her play. “If it wasn’t for singing or dancing, many women couldn’t be there. They had to do it secretly. But these women were rebelling and thanks to her many of us can do so today,” says Giurfa.

“Today there are many more contemporary percussionists whom I greatly admire,” he adds. Without seeing the example of a woman on stage with such a powerful instrument, I think it would have been more difficult. But luckily I can see myself reflected in them.”