Attentive ears: the plural voices of Itamar Assumpção

Abstract

This work presents a reading of the song “Prezadíssimos ouvintes”, by Itamar Assumpção and Domingos Pellegrini, originally recorded in 1985, on the record Sampa midnight – isso não vai ficar assim, by Itamar Assumpção – one of the most representative names of “Vanguarda Paulista” – very irreverent and creative music scene, which initially emerged at the limits of the small theater Lira Paulistana – also an independent music label, on which Itamar Assumpção recorded his first LP, Beleléu leléu eu, in 1981. The purpose of this study is to show that, among the different strategies used by Itamar throughout his career, there is a compositional model that privileges the multiplicity of voices and genres, thus establishing dialogues with his cultural and / or affective memory, as we will see in the song addressed. The analysis is based, above all, on the notions of voice and orality, by Paul Zumthor (2010); “plural voices”, by Adriana Cavarero (2011); and song and intonation, by Luiz Tatit, (2002).