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Those were times of great loneliness, great anguish, a strong feeling of defeat, when life was all uphill, you’d lost friends, you’d lost work, you’d lost the University, you’d lost your parents -- very hard times, very, very hard -- and you would come to a place like Nano Acevedo’s Peña Javiera, the only authentic peña that existed early in the dictatorship, where the spirit booster’s life was as hard as yours. If you were a musician, you could go there with your guitar -- or if you didn’t have a guitar but said, "I’d like to sing," there was a guitar there that you picked up and you sang. It was going to a place where there were others like you, as bad off as you, and you didn’t feel alone, so you felt better. Those experiences were valuable; they gave us strength, a sense of power. Nano Acevedo was very courageous, he was very courageous.

Nano Acevedo, composer, musician:

Saturday was a bad night for restaurant owners. Fear was widespread and besides, there was a curfew. Finally, the owner said, "Alright, try it once, this coming Saturday." That night the place was full and he did a good business. He charged a small cover for us and the rest (the food and drink sales) were his. Little by little, by word of mouth, the place began to fill up, we added Friday nights and could almost live on what we earned there two nights a week. When the curfew was 11 o’clock, we’d start at 8 and end at 10:30 or quarter to 11. There was a certain kind of car, taxi, that was allowed to run a few minutes over the curfew. As the curfew got later, we’d extend the hours of the peña. Sometimes we’d stay there till the next day. The police would come now and then. They’d padlock the place and cart everyone off to jail. The peña lasted until 1980. I let it go, not because I had to, but because I was tired of it and there was no longer any risk involved. I’m addicted to risk. Some people are addicted to marijuana, cocaine, tobacco, alcohol. I’m not addicted to those things, but I love to do things that are not so easy…


You had that nourishment from the artists performing there who sang, who played, from the person beside you, across from you, etc. And you’d think about what the artist said, about the song, and you’d sing it, you’d go out and get the cassette. Those were the things that made you feel alive, that gave meaning to your expression, to your way of being. It was your contact with the prior generation, with whom you couldn’t have a conversation or discussion. We would listen to those songs and would say, "Now what did Patricio Manns mean by ‘life’s meanderers’?" And we’d go round and round until we came to an interpretation of a poetic phrase. Well, that’s how the Canto Nuevo emerged.

I’d say that what most identifies the Canto Nuevo is its language, more than the music. Its language is sibylline, clandestine, with a subliminal message. When I say, "Spring is the doors of your house, my love," I’m offering the whole society, the new world, the desire to live again in the midst of this powerful winter we’re living. It was almost telepathic. The language of the New Chilean Song was explicit, combative. Categorically, that was its social expression. The idea of the Canto Nuevo was to be able to write and say things without people knowing the hidden message, except your friends, of course. That was an important challenge.

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