The group of creatives immerses themselves in the musical cultural ecosystem of the Colombian South Pacific, with the commitment to rescue part of the voices of its protagonists, the instruments, stories and ancestral sounds led by the “marimba de chonta”, with the intention of providing new spaces that allow to keep alive this conglomerate of traditions and in this way to spread, transmit and preserve the musical ecosystem of the Pacific.

 

https://www.facebook.com/oimarimbi/photos/a.774632102694910/1741173216040789/?type=3

 

The adventure video game “Oí Marimbí”, designed for children from 7 to 10 years old, was one of the winning projects of the 2019 Crea Digital Co-production Stimulus, awarded by the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of ICTs and in 2020 it was recognized during the Show Room: So Big and Playing 2020. This video game experience, which was officially presented by different social networks on August 14, can last 1 hour and 30 minutes, it is a 2D video game for Android / iOS platforms, which It is now available through the Google Play application stores and Apple's AppStore.

 

The project team is led by Héctor Javier Tascón Hernández, Author of the “Oí” Method and Director of the GIMPAS research group of the Departmental Institute of Fine Arts; Jorge Alberto Vega Rivera, Director of the LINT research group at the Universidad del Cauca; José Venancio Palacios García, founder and director of software development of the Cali company Intuitiva S.A.S. and Ángela María Revelo Castro, producer and project coordinator at La Valiente Estudio, in Popayán.

 

The project arises from the research work of the Colombian musician and teacher Héctor Javier Tascón Hernández, who had been exploring the music of the Colombian South Pacific since 2006. During his trips to Guapi, he realized the great difficulty of learning to play this instrument, given both by the tuning and by the touches that are generated in relation to the sounds of nature, which causes that even the inhabitants of the Pacific have difficulties to continue with the tradition.

 

After a few years, based on what he learned with the teachers of the region, Héctor Tascón created the “OÍ Method”, which is a didactic bet that works by marking the marimba tablets with the letter “O” and the letter “ I ”, which facilitates the explanation on the interpretation of the staves and requintas.

 

The "OÍ Method" allows all those passionate about marimba music, who do not have musical knowledge, go step by step in the interpretation of the bordón, the requinta and the most popular traditional airs of the Colombian South Pacific.

 

On the other hand, Jorge Alberto Vega Rivera, director of the Laboratory and Narrative Image and Transmedia LINT research group at the University of Cauca, was developing projects around the design of interactive experiences, technological appropriation and digital convergence strategies, in related contexts with the tangible and intangible heritage of the Cauca region.

 

When meeting with the work of Professor Tascón around the marimba, they establish contact and integrate their efforts in order to design an interface that allows interaction between people who cultivate and teach the rhythms of the marimba and users interested in learning, explore and share the sounds and content that emerge from this cultural environment.

 

In this way, in 2016, thanks to contact with the Pacific community and with businessmen from the Cauca and Valle del Cauca region, the scope of the design proposal of the "Oí Marimbí" project was evaluated, integrating to the project the software development company Intuitiva SAS, based in Cali and directed by José Venancio Palacios García, as a result of this inter-institutional union a video game is created that collects and disseminates the musical traditions of the Pacific, all this, from the Written, visual and audiovisual teaching materials, developed by Professor Héctor Javier Tascón with the “OÍ Method”.

 

In this video game, the player accompanies Marimbí, an 8-year-old boy, on his journey to become a legendary sailor from the Colombian Pacific.

 

The video game allows the exploration of the sound and visual universe of the songs, rhythms, knowledge and characters of the “marimba de chonta” music of the Pacific Coast. The children to whom “Oí Marimbí” is addressed are digital natives because they live in an environment where the use of ICT and other new technologies is continuous.

 

More Info:

 

Angela Maria Revelo Castro

General Producer

Email: angela.revelo@lavaliente.co