Writing characteristics of the traditional asturian song

Abstract

Of the literature written in Asturian there is an abundant chronology that contrasts with the scant knowledge of the musical use that is made of this language. This is due to the fact that the little documentation preserved from the High Middle Ages only provides religious texts and because orality in musical transmission still prevails today. This article reviews the state of musical writing in the Asturian language —in scores and recordings— describing the linguistic characteristics that these pioneering works show, thus wanting to shed light on the phonological and lexicological mechanisms immersed in the oldest melodies that oral memory still treasures of the Asturian people: the asturianadas. And all this is achieved through examples that have been analyzed and documented. These examples are signed with the purpose of perceiving problems related to the transition from oral tradition to written form in the musical field. The goal is to bring forth knowledge from a rich phenomenology that has been barely explored in scientific and academic works.