Con la msica a otra parte is the result of a long journey, a trek along a path that is a sublimated sublimation; that is, it channels and transforms one impulse, to practice music, into another: to write about music. It is a sublimated sublimation because the redirected desire is not a socially unacceptable force; the diversion did not intend to arrest a destructive urge. Both impulses are socially acceptable, but making music was transformed into writing about music because each practice has its own track, requiring full attention. These are eight tales based on Puerto Rican popular songs, each one taking music to a place that sometimes the song titles do not anticipate and sometimes is a congruent destination but unexpected, in its outcome or its details or both. Con la msica a otra parte is an example of what Gabriel Garca Mrquez said should be invented: "fiction from fiction." These are tales that despite originating in songs and being peppered with the occasional event or personal reference, are like the horse that turns into a unicorn and exists as a new being. They have a rhythm that obeys a special, distinct clave; it is not son, or brazilian, or iga but it still has a pulse that controls everything else: melodies that can be as strong as they are delicate and harmonies that swirl because they are true, even though they don't exist outside the tales that emerge from the songs. They are fiction from fiction and therein lies their truth. Their charm is both their novelty and their familiarity. Con la msica a otra parte changes music as it passes from one medium to another, as it transfers from storied truth to fable. The book is a run through orchestras, discography, and protagonists of musical and everyday life that traces the social, political, and cultural complexities of Puerto Rico throughout the 20th century. This book invites us to scrutinize the soundtrack of a bygone era and to reflect on the familiarity that the songs evoke in us, in the process unmasking the harshness and complexity of the human condition.
