Singing and serving through music

Everything began at the end of 2012, with the visit of a woman to the house “Caminho do Serviço” (Path of Service), a place where the Network-of-Light of Southern Argentina gathers to record songs, say prayers and watch the sharings of Trigueirinho and other transmissions of the Community-of-Light of Figueira. As reports the coordinator of the group, Estevan (Hernán Pérez Huezó), “She was a sister of a man who was imprisoned in Viedma, Argentina, and she needed wood to organize a carpentry inside the prison, as this would give him points for good conduct and would relieve his penalty.

So we went to visit the prisoner, who put us in contact with another brother from the prison, who wanted to make a music workshop. We then made contact with the responsible for the prison, to check how we could collaborate in that sense. And this is how the idea arose to make a choir inside the prison, many internees appeared who joined, culminating in the formation of the choir”.

Choral Workshop Project

Thus, since May 2013, after the approval of the cultural Project called “Choral Workshop” in the cultural area of the prison, the group meets every Saturday morning to sing with the internees that participate. Of voluntary and humanitarian character, the project does not offer points of good conduct, but even so it has attracted detainees who came on their own. Since then, the task in the prison has been developing with a lot of force, seriousness and commitment on the part of everyone.

Network-of-Light group

The Network-of-Light of Southern Argentina, which gathers in Viedma, in the “Path of Service House”, has a weekly rhythm of rehearsals, on Wednesdays, after the sharing of Trigueirinho, and on Saturdays with the  prisoners inside the prison in Viedma. Composed of nine members of the Network-of-Light of Viedma, the group has the participation, every two months, of members of the Network-of-Light of other cities of Argentina, including General Roca, Bahía Blanca, Neuquén, Bariloche, Cutral Có and Cármen de Patagones.

Summing all the members of the Network-of-Light of Southern Argentina, of the other cities and of the detainees – who are an average of 16 people – the choir has 40 people altogether. There are also, among them, some participants who are not members of the Network-of-Light, but who are close, and totally involved with the activity.

The objective of the Network-of-Light of Southern Argentina is to bring light, love, peace, faith, harmony and hope. The tools found by them are: music, chant, prayer, and above all the building of a bond they have created with the internees through assiduity and fraternal love. Most of the internees who participate in the choir belong to religious groups which have their services and ceremonies established inside the prison.

“Our work – highlights Estevan – is to share spiritual energy and impulses of upliftment and light through chant and music. Many of them have made real confessions before the group, showing their repentance, their pain, their sadness, within an atmosphere of a lot of respect and silence before everything. Through this objective, a mixed choir has arisen, composed by masculine voices of the prison and feminine voices of the Network-of-Light groups of Southern Argentina”.

Among the internees that participated appeared Cristian Hernandes, a prisoner who was the protagonist of a video made there. “When we offered to him to sing the stanzas as soloist of the song, he gave a lot of importance to this opportunity. He then created a text and sang it with a lot of devotion”.

Creating songs

With compositions of their own and also of other composers, the lyrics touch on hope, joy and peace. For the execution of the songs, the group utilizes several instruments, such as the quena, the pincuyo, the sicus and the flute (wind instruments). For percussion, they use the Peruvian box, the bongom sheiker (huevito), and sometimes drums. The string instruments: the guitar, the piano and the charango.

Estevan explains that the compositions in general are of his own authorship and that after they are made he presents them to the group for approval: “I feel a lot of inner joy and an intense yearning that the music and the message may reach many people”.

Activities of the group

The group has been participating in activities since August 2013, when they made their first show in the library of the prison of Viedma. In February 2014, they made the second  presentation in the place, this time with the participation of members of the Network-of-Light of other regions of Argentina. In September 2015, the presentation was in the Cathedral of Viedma, when the detainees were allowed to leave to participate in the choir.

Another important movement of the group was the recording, in November 2016, of videos for the program “Music for the Healing and Upliftment of Humanity”. The last meeting of the Choir was held from July 28 thru 30 of this year.

Estevan expresses his feelings upon seeing the results of the work with music. “Great peace is felt, great love, great joy and above all a lot of brotherhood. Prejudices, fears and false ideas are falling. In these meetings there vanish the ideas that it is we who behave well and that it is they who behave badly and now are paying for it”.

According to Estevan, the beauty and harmony in music attract from heaven sublime presences, who come in aid and protection of humanity and of the other Kingdoms of Nature. “Music and chant express our inner essence. When inspired by the spirit, they become sacred instruments, which conduct us to love and to peace”, he concludes.

Information:

redluzargentinasur@fraterinternacional.org