Alturas de Macchu Picchu
| Alturas de Macchu Picchu | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | October 1981 | |||
| Recorded | July 1980 – August 1981 | |||
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| Genres |
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| Length | 37:08 | |||
| Label | SyM | |||
| Producer | Daniel Camino | |||
| Los Jaivas chronology | ||||
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Alturas de Macchu Picchu[a] is the sixth studio album by the Chilean rock band Los Jaivas, released in October 1981 on the SyM label.[8] It is a concept album that sets to music selected verses of the homonymous poem by the Chilean Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda, which forms part of his 1950 collection Canto General.[9] The record was created and largely recorded in and around Paris, where the band had lived in political exile since 1977, and was conceived by the Peruvian filmmaker Daniel Camino Diez Canseco, who also produced a companion television special filmed among the ruins of Machu Picchu and narrated by the Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa.[10][11]
Blending progressive rock, Andean folk instrumentation and passages of purely orchestral sound, the album is widely regarded as the artistic high point of Los Jaivas' career and as one of the most significant Latin American rock records of its era.[12][13] It was ranked the second-best Chilean album of all time by the Chilean edition of Rolling Stone in 2008, behind only Violeta Parra's Las últimas composiciones (1966).[3] The televised special that accompanied its release became a landmark of Chilean broadcasting and has since been reissued on DVD with remastered audio.[14]
Background
[edit]Following the release of Canción del Sur in 1977, Los Jaivas and their families relocated to France, arriving in Paris on 23 March of that year.[8] They spent a season in Biarritz before settling at the Les Glycines residence in Châtenay-Malabry, on the outskirts of Paris, which they used as both a home and a workshop for years afterward; concert bookings in Europe helped support the group during this period.[8][15]
In Buenos Aires the band had met the Peruvian film producer Daniel Camino Diez Canseco, who had also settled in Paris.[10] At the end of 1980, Camino traveled to France determined to find the band, though he had no address for them; his only lead was the Chilean artist René Olivares, who had designed several of the group's album covers.[11] After weeks of searching, Camino located the musicians at their house in Châtenay-Malabry and proposed an ambitious project: a large-scale Latin American cantata based on Neruda's Alturas de Machu Picchu, to be recorded on-site at the ruins for television and narrated by a prominent literary figure.[11][8] He initially hoped to involve guest vocalists such as Mercedes Sosa and Chabuca Granda, though this never came to fruition and the album was ultimately performed by Los Jaivas alone.[10]
Los Jaivas were, at first, reluctant to commit to the idea. According to Camino, he told the band that he would be reachable in Madrid for about a month before departing for Peru, in case they changed their minds.[10] The former Los Jaivas member Alberto Ledo, before leaving the group to pursue solo projects, gave the band an instrumental piece; struck by its ethereal quality, keyboardist Eduardo Parra titled it "Del Aire al Aire," after the poem's opening line.[15] Argentine musician Ledo also blended zampoña and delay effects with birdsong recorded in the garden of the band's residence for the track, which was produced with the French sound engineer Dominique Strabach before the band's departure for the United States and would become the foundation for the rest of the album.[12][15] Days later, the band told Camino they had begun composing "La Poderosa Muerte"; Camino, in turn, brought in Mario Mutis, a founding member who had left the group during the making of Los Sueños de América (1974) and now returned to take part in the new project.[10]
By early 1981, while the band toured Europe, Camino repeatedly wrote and telephoned them to check on their progress; bandmember Claudio Parra later recalled that the group had largely set the assignment aside amid the demands of touring, and that Camino was the one who kept the idea alive.[16]
Composition
[edit]The band selected fragments of Neruda's twelve-canto poem to set to music, discarding the alternative of composing a purely instrumental accompaniment to a spoken reading. Vocalist Eduardo "Gato" Alquinta noted in the documentary Los Jaivas cuentan la historia that the group usually composed melodies first and added lyrics afterward, but that on this album they instead had to fit music to verses that already existed, a process he found considerably more demanding.[8] As none of the band members had yet visited Machu Picchu itself, they worked from photographs of the site while composing "La Poderosa Muerte," "Antigua América" and "Amor Americano."[15]
Each song draws on a different portion of the poem. The title of the opening track, "Del Aire al Aire," comes from the poem's first canto. "La Poderosa Muerte" combines lines from the second, third, sixth and seventh cantos, which the band linked thematically around the idea of death, though—somewhat paradoxically—it borrows nothing directly from the fourth canto that gives the song its title.[15][12] "Amor Americano" is built from the eighth canto, "Águila Sideral" from the ninth, and "Antigua América" from three lines of the tenth. "Sube a Nacer Conmigo Hermano" and its instrumental coda, "Final," draw almost in full from the poem's twelfth and closing canto.[15][12]
Musically, the album alternates between sung settings and instrumental passages. "Águila Sideral" evokes the flight of a condor over the Andes through propulsive drumming and Andean flutes set against a prominent electric-bass line; "Amor Americano" adopts the loping rhythm of a northern Chilean trote; and "Sube a Nacer Conmigo Hermano" is cast in the rhythm of the Venezuelan joropo.[12] "La Poderosa Muerte," the album's longest and most ambitious piece, moves through martial, cueca and progressive-rock passages, linked by extended solos on electric guitar, piano and minimoog, while "Antigua América" is a fully instrumental showcase for each musician's technique. Critics have often summarized the record's sound as a fusion of Andean folk instrumentation, symphonic keyboard textures and progressive rock, with vocal harmonies, wind instruments and natural sound effects given particular prominence throughout.[12][17]
Recording
[edit]The album's recording sessions took place between July 1980 and August 1981, with the principal album sessions occurring in 1981.[8][10] "Del Aire al Aire" was recorded at the band's residence in Les Glycines, Châtenay-Malabry, in July 1980, with Dominique Strabach engineering.[15] "La Poderosa Muerte" featured tarka, electric guitar (played by Alquinta), bass, drums, trutruca, minimoog, tubular bells, electric piano and piano.[12] During its recording Alquinta lost his voice completely; on the advice of a friend, the band consulted a practitioner in the Boulogne area of Paris, and an intravenous sulfur treatment allowed Alquinta to recover his voice in time to complete the vocal take.[18] Alquinta also played quena and ocarina on "La Poderosa Muerte" and "Sube a Nacer Conmigo Hermano," and quena on "Águila Sideral," on which Mutis played bass and Alquinta played guitar.[18][12]
"Sube a Nacer Conmigo Hermano" was recorded at the EMI-Electrola studios in Cologne, West Germany, in June 1981 during a tour of the country, with the Italian engineer Luciano Piccinno recording the vocals; the song's main riff was built from a minimoog line played by Claudio Parra.[15] For the track, Alquinta used a Gibson Les Paul Standard, an acoustic guitar, a Rickenbacker bass, a Venezuelan cuatro and zampoña.[18] The remaining tracks were recorded and mixed at the Pathé Marconi studios in Paris in July and August 1981, with sound engineer Daniel Michel(e).[15] The principal recording work was completed in 1981.[19]
Artwork
[edit]The album's original artwork, used on the first Chilean, Peruvian, Argentine and West German pressings, reproduced the painting Inti Huatana, an oil work by René Olivares depicting the sacred Intihuatana stone; the image was restored for the 2004 reissue.[19][15] Beginning with the 1982 Chilean edition, the cover was replaced with an alternative Olivares painting showing a masked Bolivian dancer holding a crystal ball—an image originally intended for the following Los Jaivas album, Aconcagua.[15]
Release
[edit]Ahead of the album's release, Los Jaivas toured from August to September 1981.[20] On 7, 15 and 16 August they played the Obras stadium in Buenos Aires, marking the band's return to Argentina after several years' absence.[21][22][23] Owing to limited rehearsal time, the band performed only "Sube a Nacer Conmigo Hermano" from the still-unreleased album during this tour, which continued through several Chilean cities and concluded in Tacna, Peru, from where the band traveled on to film the television special.[2][15]
Television special
[edit]Camino secured permission from Peruvian president Fernando Belaúnde for the band to film at Machu Picchu — according to the band's biographer Pamela Urbina Alvial, the Rolling Stones had separately sought permission to perform at the site and been refused.[24] More than thirty crew members hauled instruments up to the site, with Claudio Parra's grand piano and the sound system airlifted in by helicopter, a logistical effort financed largely by the band itself.[2][15][13] Filming took place between 9 and 12 September 1981, in the hours when the ruins were free of tourists, under the direction of Reynaldo (also spelled Reinaldo) Sepúlveda and with the participation of more than thirty crew and cast members; the musicians mimed to the studio recordings against the Incan backdrop.[8][15][10][14] Camino's original ambition to include guest vocal performances by Mercedes Sosa and Chabuca Granda was not realized.[14]
The special was narrated by the Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa and produced jointly by Canal 13, the television station of the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, and Peru's state broadcaster, Radio Televisión Peruana.[19][14] It premiered in Chile on Canal 13's cultural programming block on 8 October 1981, and was also broadcast on Peruvian television and radio.[19][25][12][26] Broadcast on a state-supervised network during Chile's military dictatorship, the program's blend of Indigenous imagery, exiled rock musicians and Neruda's leftist poetry struck contemporary audiences as unusually free of censorship for its time.[27] The special has since been restored on DVD with a new stereo mix and a 5.1 surround remix, and was reissued again in 2004 alongside a remastered CD to mark the centenary of Neruda's birth.[14]
Album release and subsequent tours
[edit]Alturas de Macchu Picchu was released in October 1981 through the SyM label, owned by the duo Sonia y Myriam.[28] The band first presented the complete album in Chile at the Teatro Caupolicán in Santiago in October 1982, after having premiered the work in Paris earlier that year.[29] In November 1981 they gave a lavishly staged performance in Lima, Peru.[30] The suite formed by "La Poderosa Muerte," "Amor Americano" and "Sube a Nacer Conmigo Hermano" became a recurring feature of the band's live sets, including appearances at the Viña del Mar festival in 2002 and 2011, the latter also incorporating "Final."
On 7 July 2011, at the invitation of the mayor of Cusco and with the president of Peru in attendance, Los Jaivas performed the album in full, live at Machu Picchu, as part of celebrations marking the centennial of the site's scientific rediscovery by Hiram Bingham III.[31] The 40th anniversary of the studio album's release was marked with a concert at the Estadio San Carlos de Apoquindo on 11 December 2021.[32] The album was reissued on 180-gram colored vinyl for Record Store Day in April 2025 by the British label the state51 Conspiracy, which described the record as a landmark fusion of Andean folk music with the psychedelic and progressive-rock idioms of the era.[27] Following a concert at Santiago's Estadio Nacional Julio Martínez Prádanos in December 2025, Los Jaivas launched a "45 años de Alturas de Macchu Picchu" tour across Chile in 2026, which included the live debut of two previously unreleased 1970s compositions and the premiere, in March 2026, of a short documentary revisiting the album's creation.[33]
Track listing
[edit]Lyrics by Pablo Neruda; music and arrangements by Los Jaivas, except where noted.
Side one
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Del aire al aire" (instrumental; written by Alberto Ledo) | 2:17 |
| 2. | "La poderosa muerte" | 11:12 |
| 3. | "Amor americano" (Eduardo Alquinta plays bass; lead guitar performed by Mario Mutis) | 5:28 |
Side two
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 4. | "Águila sideral" (released as a single in Chile and France) | 5:22 |
| 5. | "Antigua América" (instrumental) | 5:38 |
| 6. | "Sube a nacer conmigo hermano" | 4:46 |
| 7. | "Final" | 2:37 |
A 30th-anniversary CD/DVD edition, released in 2011, added two bonus tracks recorded live at the Palais des Glaces in Paris in May 1982: "La poderosa muerte (Live)" and "Final (Live)".[34]
Personnel
[edit]Adapted from the liner notes of the 1995 reissue and the 2004 reissue.[35][15]
Los Jaivas
- Eduardo "Gato" Alquinta – lead vocals, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, bass, cuatro, quena, zampoña, ocarina, tarka
- Mario Mutis – bass, electric guitar, quena, zampoña, tarka, backing vocals
- Eduardo Parra – electric piano, minimoog, tarka
- Claudio Parra – piano, harpsichord, electric piano, minimoog, marimba, tarka
- Gabriel Parra – drums, bombo legüero, tubular bells, chromatic timbales, trutruca, tarka, backing vocals
Guest musicians
- Alberto Ledo – zampoña, trompe, bombo legüero, bells, trutruca, and lead vocals on "Del Aire al Aire"
- Patricio Castillo – tarka on "La Poderosa Muerte" and quena on "Águila Sideral"
Technical
- Daniel Camino – producer
- Dominique Strabach – recording and mixing engineer ("Del Aire al Aire")
- Luciano Piccinno – recording and mixing engineer ("Sube a Nacer Conmigo Hermano")
- Daniel Michel(e) – recording and mixing engineer (remaining tracks)
- René Olivares – cover artwork, band logo, illustrations
Reception
[edit]Retrospective assessments of Alturas de Macchu Picchu have been largely positive. Writing for the Chilean outlet NaciónRock, Gonzalo Ugarte C. described the album as the outcome of the band's sustained experimentation, crediting it with anchoring the group's evolving sound into a distinctive, immersive style rooted in Latin American identity.[12] The English-language blog The Progressive Subway praised the record's synthesis of Andean tradition with Western progressive rock, noting how electric guitars and electric piano sit alongside a wide array of traditional instruments to create what the site termed an "Andes prog" sound.[17] Reviewing a 2025 vinyl reissue, the British retailer Record Store Day likened the album's ambition to Pink Floyd's Live at Pompeii and compared its reinterpretation of traditional material to the work of British folk-rock acts such as Fairport Convention and Trees.[27]
The album has also drawn recognition on retrospective critics' lists. In 2006, the magazine Al Borde ranked it 24th on its list of the 250 most important Ibero-American rock albums.[36] In 2008, the Chilean edition of Rolling Stone placed it second in its ranking of the best Chilean albums of all time, behind Violeta Parra's Las últimas composiciones.[3] It is ranked 23rd on the "Los 600 de Latinoamérica" list of the most important Latin American albums.[37] In May 2005, the album was cited by Absolut Vodka as one of the masterpieces of Spanish-language rock music as part of a promotional retrospective of the genre.[13]
Charts
[edit]| Publication | Country | List | Year | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Al Borde | United States | 250 Most Important Ibero-American Rock Albums | 2006 | 24 |
| Rolling Stone | Chile | 50 Best Chilean Albums | 2008 | 2 |
| Los 600 Discos de Latinoamérica | Latin America (regional) | Los 600 de Latinoamérica | — | 23 |
Legacy
[edit]Alturas de Macchu Picchu remains Los Jaivas' best-known and most widely reissued album, and the accompanying television special is frequently cited as a defining moment in Chilean cultural history, credited with introducing the band—and Neruda's poetry—to a mass Latin American audience during a period of political repression in Chile.[14][27] The album was reissued on VHS in 1999 under the title Machu Picchu en Vivo, and the band revisited the work again during a 2004 tour marking the centenary of Neruda's birth.[19] Decades later, the record continues to be commemorated with anniversary concerts, remasters and new documentary material, including the 2011 live performance at Machu Picchu, the 2021 fortieth-anniversary concert, the 2025 Record Store Day vinyl edition, and the tour launched in 2026 to mark 45 years since the album's creation.[31][27][33]
Notes
[edit]- ↑ The album's title has always been printed with the double-c spelling "Macchu Picchu" on its packaging, from the original 1981 Chilean pressing through the 2025 vinyl reissue.[6] The archaeological site itself is spelled with a single c ("Machu Picchu"), and some secondary sources—including press coverage, streaming platforms and CD reissue listings—render the album's title accordingly, correcting it to match the standard spelling of the place rather than reflecting any change made to the album itself.[7]
References
[edit]- ↑ Ortega, Rubén (22 April 2021). "Seis óperas de rock en español para revivir su formato". Indie Rocks! (in Spanish). Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- 1 2 3 Rojas, Fabián Nuñez (3 December 2021). "Mario Mutis nos cuenta la épica historia de Alturas de Macchu Picchu". Rock&Pop (in Spanish). Retrieved 15 October 2022.
- 1 2 3 Rojas, Fabián Nuñez (16 September 2021). "¿Estás de acuerdo? Los 10 mejores discos chilenos según Rolling Stone". Rock&Pop (in Spanish). Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- ↑ Caretas: ilustración peruana (in Spanish). Empresa Editora Caretas S. A. August 2009. p. 8.
- ↑ Rivera Fernández, Andrés (2016) [2015]. "Los Jaivas y la música latinoamericana". In Guajardo Salinas, Aldo (ed.). Los Jaivas y la música latinoamericana: Cuaderno Pedagógico (PDF). Santiago, Chile: Consejo Nacional de la Cultura y las Artes. pp. 20–53. ISBN 978-956-352-117-7. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- ↑ "Los Jaivas, Pablo Neruda – Alturas De Macchu Picchu". Discogs. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- ↑ Vergara, Claudio (19 November 2021). "Los Jaivas celebran 40 años de Alturas de Machu Picchu con un concierto en San Carlos de Apoquindo". La Tercera (in Spanish). Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "LOS JAIVAS Y LA MÚSICA LATINOAMERICANA - Cuaderno Pedagógico" (PDF). cultura.gob.cl (in Spanish). May 2015. pp. 18–43. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- ↑ Wiser, Danny (13 December 2020). "CHILE: Alturas De Machu Pichu - Los Jaivas". 200worldalbums.com. Retrieved 25 October 2023.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Los Jaivas: Eduardo Parra, desde París, a 40 años de 'Alturas de Machu Picchu' [Entrevista]". Peru21 (in Spanish). 14 August 2021. Retrieved 8 November 2022.
- 1 2 3 "El día que Mario Vargas Llosa fue el narrador de 'Los Jaivas' en Machu Picchu: el especial olvidado de 1981". Infobae (in Spanish). 16 April 2025. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Ugarte C., Gonzalo (17 October 2017). "Disco Inmortal: Los Jaivas – Alturas de Macchu Picchu (1981)". Nación Rock (in Spanish). Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- 1 2 3 "Artist Profiles: Los Jaivas". World Music Central. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Alturas de Macchu Picchu". MusicaPopular.cl (in Spanish). Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 "Una historia oral sobre «Alturas de Machu Picchu» por Mario Mutis -" (in Spanish). 22 September 2020. Retrieved 15 October 2022.
- ↑ Vergara, Claudio (10 October 2021). "El hombre que inventó Alturas de Machu Picchu". La Tercera. Retrieved 8 November 2022.
- 1 2 "Lost in Time: Los Jaivas – Alturas de Macchu Picchu". The Progressive Subway. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- 1 2 3 Muñoz, Hector (15 January 2023). "Eduardo "Gato" Alquinta: 5 grandes interpretaciones en Los Jaivas". Futuro Chile (in Spanish). Retrieved 31 January 2023.
- 1 2 3 4 5 "Alturas de Macchu Picchu". Memoria Chilena, Biblioteca Nacional de Chile (in Spanish). Retrieved 15 October 2022.
- ↑ García, Marisol (1 August 2013). Canción valiente (in Spanish). Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial Chile. p. 196. ISBN 978-956-9339-06-6. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- ↑ Guerrero, Gloria (1 February 2012). Estadio Obras. El templo del Rock: Elogio de la sed (in Spanish). Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial Argentina. p. 80. ISBN 978-950-07-3570-4. Retrieved 15 October 2022.
- ↑ Bitar, Marcelo Fernandez (1 November 2015). 50 años de rock en Argentina (in Spanish). Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial Argentina. p. 272. ISBN 978-950-07-5429-3. Retrieved 15 October 2022.
- ↑ Ordaz, Luis; Montenergro, R.; Horvath, Ricardo (1985). El Canto y el baile (in Spanish). Centro Editor de América Latina. p. 11. ISBN 978-950-25-0753-8.
- ↑ Chile, C. N. N. (13 August 2013). "Alturas de Machu Picchu: Un hito en la carrera de Los Jaivas". CNN Chile (in Spanish). Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- ↑ Vergara, Claudio (10 October 2021). "El hombre que inventó Alturas de Machu Picchu". La Tercera. Retrieved 8 November 2022.
- ↑ "Temas220-232". Hoy (in Spanish). Araucaria Ltda.: 15 October 1981. Retrieved 19 October 2022.
- 1 2 3 4 5 "Los Jaivas – Alturas de Macchu Picchu". Record Store Day. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- ↑ Vergara, Claudio (12 October 2021). "¿Cómo era Machu Picchu cuando Los Jaivas tocaron su mítico disco en 1981?". La Tercera. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
- ↑ "Gira Nacional Macchu Picchu - Los Jaivas". Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- ↑ Oiga (in Spanish). Empresa Editora Eusko-Andina. 1983. p. 3.
- 1 2 "Alturas de Macchu Picchu: el día en que Los Jaivas contaron en..." Canal 13 (in Spanish). Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- ↑ Campillay, José (19 November 2021). "40 años de". ADN (in Spanish). Retrieved 15 October 2022.
- 1 2 "Comenzó gira "45 años de Alturas de Macchu Picchu" de Los Jaivas". El Mostrador (in Spanish). 18 May 2026. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- ↑ "Los Jaivas, Pablo Neruda – Alturas De Macchu Picchu". Discogs. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
- ↑ Alturas De Macchu Picchu (booklet). Columbia Records. 1995. 2 - 462057.
- ↑ "Los 250 mejores álbumes de rock iberoamericano". Al Borde. 2006.
- ↑ "Alturas de Machu Picchu – Los Jaivas". Los 600 Discos de Latinoamérica (in Spanish). Retrieved 27 September 2026.
Bibliography
[edit]- Reale Ahumada, Alan (2016) [2015]. "La historia de Los Jaivas". In Guajardo Salinas, Aldo (ed.). Los Jaivas y la música latinoamericana: Cuaderno Pedagógico (PDF). Santiago, Chile: Consejo Nacional de la Cultura y las Artes. pp. 12–19. ISBN 978-956-352-117-7. Retrieved 19 September 2026.
- Rivera Fernández, Andrés (2016) [2015]. "Los Jaivas y la música latinoamericana". In Guajardo Salinas, Aldo (ed.). Los Jaivas y la música latinoamericana: Cuaderno Pedagógico (PDF). Santiago, Chile: Consejo Nacional de la Cultura y las Artes. pp. 20–53. ISBN 978-956-352-117-7. Retrieved 19 September 2026.
