Dongu

Dongu, Giovanna

Biography

Born on 5 May 1974 in Sassari. She started studying Piano from a very early age and graduated in 1993 with top marks cum laude at the Conservatory where she lived, in Sassari, and then went on to study at the Ecole Normale de Musique “Alfred Cortot” in Paris and the Roman Academy of Music. She also gained a diploma in Choral Music and Choral Conduction at the Sassari Conservatory in 1999, and a further diploma with Maestro Riccardo Dapelo in 2001 in Composition with top marks. Her compositions have been highly appreciated in important events, performed by renowned maestros and gained a number of International Competition awards (Italy, Greece, Holland, Belgium, Japan, United States ...).  In October 2011 she was invited to the University of Oldenburg to hold a Komponisten Colloquium on her works. The Musical Chapel of Assisi commissioned her to write the composition on the "Canticle of creatures" by San Francesco for the Azuni choral and instrumental ensemble and the "Laudate et Benedicite" Choir of Sassari, successfully presented at the "Pax Mundi" Festival in Assisi in 'October 2016 and March 2017 in Paris. Among his recent works, the stage action “Identità”, successfully represented in 2018 in Cagliari and Sassari, written according to a graphic and gestural notation that leaves space and possibilities for improvisation and expression for the performers. His latest work is the book "Il Solfeggio è Musica!", Published in 2021 by the Sinfonica publishing house in Milan.

"Poetica"

My music is characterized by the synthesis between the advanced languages of the contemporaneity and the richness of the musical traditions of my land. Sardinia has an exceptionally strong and charming character cultural identity that has been preserved over time with care and dedication. is a land that offers extraordinary wealth music landscape, that is undoubtedly one of the most interesting in the Mediterranean basin. Sardinia is its "world" own, in which songs, dances and poems, in their multiple forms become central elements of our lives.  I love to define "contemporary music" as "playing with sound" and I feel I have a great affinity with the world of children, that primordial part of all of us, which is made up of love for sound, need for sound ... I have studied long and passionately the reactions of children when they discover musical elements. With them, I also thought how to stimulate the ability to listen to sound in the reality in which they live and to which they belong. That’s how my book "On the footsteps of sounds ... first sound experiences."  was born. It is a book for kindergarten, primary and music schools. It was written between 2001-2005 and published by Agenda Bologna productions. The book is a journey that leads children to discover musical elements while playing in a simple and gradual way. I talk about discovery and not acquisition because the musical elements are inside us. Our voice, our movements…the steps, the jumps, the beat of our hands and even our breaths... "play music"! I strongly felt the need to depart from the traditional notation, not to criticise or deny it (in fact you will find it at the end of the journey that I traced) but to find a more immediate approach to sound. So, I used a simple reading/writing system based on colours. In this way children learn sounds and their connections without referring to a precise musical system (tonal or modal one for example), so, they play with the sounds beyond a defined genre or music system. This allowed me to introduce children to the world of the so-called "contemporary music" that I often love defining as "playing with sound“. I also wanted to trace a path to be followed not only by teachers with small pupils but also by parents themselves along with their children; in fact, I propose games that can be managed also by „non-musical" adults.

 

 

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