My name is Tania León.
I am a musician
that happens to be a composer, conductor, educator,
and I have a great advocacy for the arts
and living composers.
When I'm going to write a piece
whether it has a specific theme
or not, I have to feel the piece
I had to feel compelled to write that piece.
So I get into that space and
once I am into that space
I start hearing, in my mind, fractions that
perhaps may have something to do with a piece
and I travel around with a pad and
I jot down the sketch of that moment
and then that is that my process start.
I think that the whole thing is already internal.
You see, so I start writing and
and the technique manifests inside
of the writing. Once I see the sketches and
once I think of the piece I go to the piano
and then I might check, you know,
specifically the harmonies
and what will be the sonic background —
whether it is vertical or horizontal.
Also my intuition gets involved with
so it's not only intellectual but it's also intuition
because if I don't feel the piece I'm not so happy.
For "Project 19" I have created a piece called "Stride"
and it is a piece written in the memory of Susan B. Anthony
because of her courage and because in my
imagination I saw this woman from a century ago
moving forward like nobody's business.
I mean it was such a force.
Drive to me means inner courage
it's like talking to the self
something that we do internally
and there's this blind faith about doing something
when perhaps those that are
around you might not believe you can do it.
That is precisely why I selected the
title of the piece as "Stride,"
because you move forward no matter what.
"Stride" has it's all moving forward flow.
"Stride" for me was this gigantic woman
you know with very big legs walking,
no matter what.
In the piece, there's a section that I try to do that:
propel move with percussion,
mixed with trumpets.
And the thing is that the piece doesn't end
it continues because it's very fluid.
My voice as a composer
is the sum total of my experiences.
I was born in an island and I need water.
My spirit needs water.
To have silence or to have space, it's very important
to quiet my soul and
to get more clarity about what I need to do
and perhaps how to do it.
With "Stride" I feel courage
that inner force that one may have inside
that says "keep going."