The Cantigas de Santa María make up a songbook with over 400 compositions in Galician-Portuguese and mensural notation. They are dated between 1270 and 1282 and were composed by various individuals in the context of the court of Alfonso X. Four manuscripts of the Cantigas have been preserved, although none of them contain all the compositions.
The historiographical perspective traditionally used to approach the Cantigas leads us to imagine them as a kind of catalog: a list of numbered compositions. A collection nearly 800 years old, written in a notation we believe we understand thanks to a treatise from the period. Still, a “historicist” interpretation always opens the door to a simulation. Does it really make sense to think that we are understanding—and even perceiving—something in the same way someone in the 13th century would have? What if time has passed not only on a human scale, but has also eroded the Cantigas themselves and the soundscape that emerges from the manuscripts?
Songs of Erosion is a project that arises from a contemporary reading of the Cantigas de Santa María through the lens of erosion.
Avoiding a historicist interpretation, the musicians treat the manuscript as an archaeological artifact—an object written in a strange code, almost impossible to decipher from a purely textual perspective. To navigate its breadth and complexity, they devise a series of instructions inspired by contemporary music composition techniques and by geological processes related to erosion, allowing them to manipulate the various materials.
This concert is a laboratory where these instructions are presented in a repetitive, nearly exhausting way, inviting us to look through the rubble and sediment at what remains of these songs. Repetition can be a way of remembering—oral traditions rely on repetition for transmission. But it can also be a way of shaping: each repetition is a revival, a recreation that is both similar and subtly different. Repetition turns sound into a flow, a temporal window.
© Luis Martínez Campo
Songs of Erosion. An Archive
The Task Logbook
- Research and presentation at LodStudio Gent. Dec 2021
Charlie Usher, Clara Levy, Victor Guaita Igual.
Moveable speakers, phones, zither, violin, viola, real-time electronics
Repetition/Erosion
- as part of Towards a Ruined Theater. Kaai / Pilar Brussels. May 2024
Clara Levy, Victor Guaita Igual
hurdy-gurdy, organetto, violin, viola, tape 70’
- Jazz à Luz, Luz-Saint-Sauveur, July 2024
Clara Levy, Victor Guaita Igual
50’ violin, viola
Songs of Erosion. La Quebrantada
- Fundación Cerezales Antonino Y Cinia. León. March 2025
Clara de Asís, Clara Levy, Victor Guaita Igual
modular synth, violin, viola, tape. 120’
- Festival Musica. Strasbourg. 27th September 2025
Clara de Asís, Clara Levy, Victor Guaita Igual
Modular synth, violin, viola. 60’ +info agenda
Songs of Erosion
- Festival Archipel. Geneve. April 2025
Clara Levy, Victor Guaita Igual
violin, viola. 45’
- Bozar. Brussels. 7th October 2025
Clara Levy, Victor Guaita Igual
violin, viola, tape. 70’
Publication:
“From the Cantigas de Santa María to Songs of Erosion” (adaptreuse.org)
Recordings:
Songs of Erosion Vol. 1.
Early 2026 Discreet editions & Fundacion Cerezales Antonino Y Cinia
