Barulhos

Barulhos

Meaning “Noises” in Brazilian Portuguese, the title draws from working-class neighbourhood slang. In Africa, when someone tells stories, spins a yarn and blows smoke, he is said to make noise. In Brazil, “noise” is used to describe the roar of urban life.

Usually a noise is a pest, an annoyance that must be excluded from our living space. When the lights dim out, all sounds must cease and there comes the reign of silence. A noise is what we don’t want to hear: a neighbour, the underground, a party… A noise is made by others.

But I see these noises as a sound background, a recall of time passing, of the world’s vibrations and rumours. They tell about our society.

With Barulhos, I want to use bodies to detect these fragments and cackles of the world.

Reacting and resounding bodies

Sounds are first and foremost vibrations travelling through air and reaching our eardrums. They can journey through earth and water even faster than through air and are an alert!

So some people still, even to this day, listen to the humdrums through the floors to hear footsteps or a ca sound even before the winds carry them. And that is also why sounds echo though or bodies made of bones and water and skin.

In Barulhos, I envision a special sound device that would be spread all around the dancers and immerse them. Sound would go to-and-fro, from outside to inside, downwards and upwards, day to night. Sounds that awaken muscles, excite bodies and souls and set order or chaos.

This device is the holder of my imagination and choreography. It will become a dance partner of his own and, without it, I would not tell the same story : it is both a scenographer and meaningful.

Bouba Landrille Tchouda