Pico-Bite-Beat

Countless times I have given myself the task of thinking about the similarities that exist between an artist and a cook. I have a special admiration for all those who dedicate their lives to transforming food into poetry, into a new experience for the inner body and spirit. Both a chef and a composer find their own way of making their diverse materials, mixing and blending them in order to create a unique taste, a language of their own. Emotion and work strategies are combined in a coming and going, in an internal dialogue, in that inexhaustible search for the essential and deeply human.

It is in Pico-Bite-Beat where I first explored the idea of working with sound metaphors through food and music. To do so, I took the city as a starting point. I was particularly interested in exploring the development and impact of Mexican food within a foreign context, in this case, California, because its particular gastronomy combines a fascinating and sui generis universe of culinary endeavors, where the notions of border are diluted in the midst of a great multiculturalism, caused by globalization and great migrations. I was particularly interested in exploring the development and impact of Mexican food within a foreign context, in this case, that of California.

During the process of finding an effective and emotional line of work to face this new challenge, several questions arose: How has the food of our ancestors been reinterpreted? How have migrations from other cultures influenced Mexican gastronomy? What have been the most important factors in the development of Mexican-American cuisine?

In my search I found that the Korean community in Los Angeles eats tacos and quesadillas, only that they add "kimchi", an oriental pickle based on cabbage, ginger, scallion, garlic and radish. The famous "burritos" are no exception, since in addition to the traditional ingredients, they can be filled with "pastrami". The multiplication of the so-called "food trucks" or "food trucks" offers increasingly sophisticated innovations, which undoubtedly reaffirms a way of appropriation of the street, from a kind of democratization and multiculturalization of food. I also came across pre-Hispanic food and the nostalgia for the lost collectivity, a search to reaffirm an identity within a context where industrialization and massification of products have given rise to canned sauces and canned chilies, as well as a million little bags of tortillas artificially seasoned with corn honey and monosodium glutamate.

Based on this gastronomic reconfiguration, Pico-Bite-Beat explores sound symbolisms that break with these conventional acoustic boundaries to give rise to a new way of understanding the world, much more intermingled and musically globalized. The piece is divided into five movements: 1-Pico Street, Sopa de Piedra, 3-Kimchi-Quesadilla, 4-Burrito Pastrami-Mariscos Jalisco and 5-Guerrilla Tacos.

Both Pico Street and Guerrilla Tacos allude to the urban question, to those streets full of small local restaurants or the famous food carts mentioned above. In Sopa de Piedra we delve into the sounds of rituals and recipes in the Ajüuk language, through recordings from Tlahutiltepec, Oaxaca, along with the imaginary sounds of an ancestral cuisine.

On the other hand, in Burrito Pastrami-Mariscos Jalisco on the one hand we hear rhythmic platforms of the sounds coming from an industrial kitchen, and on the other, ambient sounds from the famous food cart "Mariscos Jalisco". Finally Kimchi Quesadilla takes us to the sound world of an imaginary culture between Mexico and Korea. Pico-Bite-Beat is dedicated to the renowned food critic Jonathan Gold who with great sensitivity, respect and admiration spoke of these small local food restaurants, precisely located on Pico Street, thus redefining the perception of Los Angeles gastronomy. It was Gold who, under a new vision without prejudice, free, fairer and more equitable, wrote for the first time about the invaluable contribution of all these small places, however modest they may be, where the migrant communities themselves have played a fundamental role.

I am deeply grateful to Jorge Verdin for his valuable collaboration in the sound design and rhythmic tracks for the Sopa de Piedra and Burrito Pastrami-Mariscos Jalisco movements. I am also grateful for the information provided by Rodrigo Llanes Castro, renowned Mexican historian and chef, about the gastronomy of our ancestors. Finally, I thank my brother Rubén Ortiz-Torres, who introduced me to Jonathan Gold's work for the first time.

— Gabriela Ortiz