| Harp music and folklore from the Venezuelan plains This is a young harpist prodigy from the Bolivarian Republic in this short home-video. To introduce himself, he says: “que tal mi gente de Venezuela. Soy Said Morales, arpista de Guanarito del Edo Portuguesa, la tierra del Silbón** y como dijo Jorge Guerrero: — Guanarito es un romance” “Hello my people of Venezuela. My name is Said Rosales, a harpist from Guanarito, Portuguesa state, the land of the Silbón**, and as Jorge Guerrero once said: Guanarito is a romance.” (which is the title of the music)** “the Silbón (or the Whistler, in English) is part of the folklore from the Venezuelan state of Portuguesa. The oral tradition portrays him as a 9-foot tall, thin man who announces himself by whistling mysteriously and then sets upon drunks on their way home and gives them a sound beating after sucking their navel to drink the hooch they had consumed. The Whistler wears a typical plainsman’s hat and carries a sack full of bones from previous victims. Tradition has it that upon unloading and counting the bones near a house, if no-one hears him, a family member dies at dawn. Here is the musical video of Said Rosales playing “Guanarito”. Arturo Rosales writes from Caracas |