Quilapayún Chante Neruda is a compilation music album released by Quilapayún in exile in France in 1983 in commemoration of the 10th Anniversary of the death of the Chilean poet and Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda – who died in September 1973.
Pablo Neruda was not a musician but he was a major inspiration to artist in the music field all over Latin America, especially for artists of the Nueva Cancion Chilena (New Chilean Song) movement. Neruda wrote the liner notes for a number of recordings released by young folk Chilean artists under the DICAP label. Many compositions were directly inspired by the poetry of Neruda and popular protest songs were often musical arrangements for his poetical text. Neruda's epic work Canto General, from which several poems featured in this recording were taken from, has been a major source of text for compositions by folk, contemporary and classical composers.
This album included a compilation of songs from 1975 to 1983 recorded by Quilapayun and new arrangements of music inspired by the poetry of Neruda along with the participation of prominent French artists who sing and narrate Neruda’s poetry in French. There are songs based on Neruda’s early work Crepusculario (Twilight Book), from his Extravagario (Extravagary), on his political verse from Canción de Geste (Songs of Protest) and from his Cien Sonetos de Amor (100 Love Sonnets). There are also musical composition based on Neruda’s work “Fulgor y Muerte de Joaquin Murieta.”
The album opens with, Complainte de Pablo Neruda, a poetical elegy written by the French poet Louis Aragon to the music of Eduardo Carrasco which prefaces the rest of the compilation. Louis Aragon, who had been a personal friend of Neruda, died shortly before the release of this album.
The verses from Neruda's poems adapted to songs were translated from their original Spanish to French by Geneviève Dourthe, Jean Marcenac, Eduardo Carrasco Jr., Emmanuelle and Gérard Clery.
Para los pueblos fué mi canto escrito en la zona del mar y viví entre el mar y los pueblos como un centinela secreto que defendía sus batallas lleno de amor 'y de rumor: porque soy el hombre sonoro, testigo de las esperanzas en este siglo asesinado…
My chant was written for the common people in the region of the sea for I lived between the sea and the people as a secretive sentinel who defended its battles full of love and rumour because I am a sonorous man, a witness to the hopes of this assassinated century…