A Place Called Music

A Place Called Music is a documentary that on the surface tells a story about an unlikely collaboration between two musicians who hail from very different backgrounds. But, on a deeper level, this story is filled with subjacent layers of meaning and questions that point us towards a personal journey in which we explore the motivations and similarities of our two characters: Daniel Medina, an indigenous musician from the deep mountains of Mexico, and Philip Glass, one of the most prominent contemporary composers from New York City.

The sensibility needed to explore both storylines has been a challenge as neither of our main characters was initially open to taking part in the documentary, so a change was needed in each of them for this film to happen. Daniel lives in a remote community that has never allowed access to a documentary crew, while Glass doesn’t enjoy being under the spotlight at this moment of his life. These limitations set how we portrayed these stories and the cinematic language we used.

Time has been a paramount factor. Philip is incredibly busy with his career and his family, and Daniel’s community is so far away and has so few resources (no electricity for instance) so the scenes we’ve worked with them have been cherry-picked. Since the scenes and our working hours were limited, we decided to aim for a polished and cinematic look. A workflow that normally is too heavy and expensive for independent documentary filmmakers.

I could not insist enough how important music is for this documentary. Even though our aim was not to make a “music documentary” we wanted to allow our audiences to enjoy the music that emerges from our characters and let it play. We want to let our audiences know that music is also a place. It is a place where Philip meets with Daniel and they get to communicate. It is a place where we, as audiences or performers, can go and explore the most abstract shapes of our human emotions.

Lastly, our aim was not only addressing Western audiences but also indigenous audiences in Mexico and around the world. There is resentment in our indigenous communities because we, the mixed race, tend to take their stories and make them ours – and these stories rarely make it back to them. So, this story is also for the Wixárika, we have worked close to their community, and we are proud to say that key members of our crew are of Wixárika descent. We can only hope that this film will inspire younger Wixárika generations, fill them with pride, and make them realize that they can follow their ancestral traditions and still enjoy some of the benefits of city life that they seek. On the other hand, we also hope to stimulate our Western audiences to appreciate the importance of cultural diversity and how varied our human condition can be.