Three musicians, three shores, one compass: to circulate Andean memory without fixed folklore or decorative fusion. Meet Puka Wali, between living heritage, shared languages, and homage to women composers.
Puka Wali, or the red skirt that serves as a compass
Sometimes a group is born from a sudden encounter, an immediate spark, almost photogenic. Puka Wali, however, was formed differently: through sedimentation, patient affinities, and those flexible and tenacious bonds woven by festivals, shared stages, backstage conversations, and musical friendships that mature away from the spotlight. Nothing spectacular at first, rather a slow certainty that eventually becomes a voice.
This voice belongs to Consuelo Jerí (Peru), Lucie Delahaye (France/Argentina), and Carole Stöcklin (Belgium). Three trajectories, three ways of inhabiting music. And yet, as soon as the ensemble takes shape, something falls into place: an intimate geography, that of the Andes, not as a postcard but as a matrix: a memory, a breath, a way of being in the world.
The name says it all, or almost: Puka Wali, the red pollera in Quechua. The Andean skirt, a garment of celebration and work, of daily dignity and unadorned beauty. The red, a color of life and community, becomes a sign here: that of music that does not want to "represent" the Andes, but to circulate them. Music that does not dress up: it moves forward, it transmits, it gathers.
A repertoire like a restitution, a gentle repair
Puka Wali does not settle into folklore as one would take refuge in a museum. Their approach is more demanding: to hold the heritage at the height of the present. The trio weaves adaptations of Latin American popular songs and original compositions. It places at the center a simple but decisive gesture: to pay tribute to women. Indeed, it honors the singers, transmitters, and composers often erased from official narratives.
Nothing of a posture, everything of a necessity. Because they are three women, because they write, compose, and arrange, they transform tradition profoundly. Indeed, when understood well, tradition ceases to be a cage: it becomes fertile ground. In their way of revisiting an Andean song, one feels this double fidelity: to the text, to the original breath and pulse, and to freedom, this other form of respect.
Three languages, three inner climates
Their music circulates between Quechua, Spanish, and French. Not as a collage, but as a palette of climates. Quechua: a telluric tenderness, a closeness to the earth and breath. Spanish: the momentum, the bright light, the fervor. French: a roundness, a modesty, a half-tone poetry. When listening, these languages do not add up: they translate into each other, they open passages. And one understands that, with Puka Wali, language is not just a vehicle: it is an instrument.
The instrumentarium also tells this pact. The voice, first, carried by the experience and depth of Consuelo Jerí, who sings memory as one holds an ancient thread between the fingers. The guitar, then, which brings the framework, the nerve, the colors of southern Argentina as well as the elegance of the arrangement. The quena and the charango, finally, which open a window in the air: a high-altitude wind, a festive light, a joyful gravity. The trio does not add up the timbres: it makes them dialogue, until achieving that rare feeling of an entire landscape contained in a few measures.
A stage birth in Europe
The project was tested in reality: that of intense rehearsals, then the audience in Belgium, in Paris, then in Berlin. This transition from the screen (the time of remote work) to presence gave the trio its coherence. Puka Wali is not a formula: it is a living matter, a way of breathing together, of adjusting looks as well as chords. And when the music finds its place on stage, it ceases to be "research": it becomes sharing.
This sharing, they express without detours: they would like the audience to "catch the virus" of Andean music. Not the fleeting enthusiasm of an exoticism, but a lasting curiosity: to listen, to learn, to transmit, to join a community. Because at heart, Puka Wali defends a very simple idea, almost radical in these times: music as a link and the link as care.
Neither reconstitution nor fusion: an alliance
What makes Puka Wali precious is precisely what it avoids. Neither fixed "reconstitution" nor decorative "fusion". Their art lies in a third way, rarer: the alliance. A horizontal construction, where each arrives with her mastery of the Ayacucho repertoire, Argentine rhythms, Andean instruments, and where the whole becomes a common language. A language that does not flatten differences: it makes them resonate.
The following interview sheds light on this weaving. They recount the genesis through encounters and festivals, the understated joy of the first session in presence, the secret life of languages in emotion, the balance between tradition and invention, the deeply feminine meaning of the red pollera, and this shared conviction: art repairs not by promising to heal the world, but by giving back to each one a part of themselves, a memory, a joy, a strength.
Let’s hear their words.
Pierre-Antoine Tsady: Your journeys are traversed by three worlds: Quechua, European, and Argentine. How did this human and cultural encounter give birth to a common voice, that of Puka Wali?
Puka Wali: The birth of Puka Wali is not the result of an isolated chance, but of a slow weaving, nourished by festivals, encounters, shared spaces around Latin American music. It is within this living community, notably during the Sonamos Latinoamérica festival, that Carole met Consuelo and Lucie. There was already, in the air, a common language made of rhythms, silences, and mutual curiosity. Carole then proposed a trio work, almost like opening a door: without certainty, but with the intuition that a sensitive space could be created there. This project was born from that intuition: our stories, far from canceling each other out, could respond to and strengthen each other.
P.-A. T.: During your first real musical session together, did you feel a cultural shock, an artistic obviousness… or a slow mutual recognition?
P. W.: After more than a year of remote work, the first meeting in presence was an immense joy. Indeed, it was done through Zoom screens, but the physical contact was irreplaceable. The ability to finally breathe together, to listen to the bodies as much as the voices, to adjust the looks as much as the chords. There was no brutal shock, nor spectacular obviousness. Rather a patient construction, nourished by collective energy and very attentive listening. We immersed ourselves in intensive rehearsal work in Brussels. Then, we took this living matter on stage. Indeed, it took place in Belgium, Paris, and then Berlin. It is there, in duration and movement, that Puka Wali found its coherence.
P.-A. T.: Your music circulates between Quechua, Spanish, and French. How do these languages modify the emotion, texture, or color of the same song?
P. W.: These three languages are deeply musical, but each carries a singular emotional charge. Quechua, an ancestral language, conveys an almost telluric tenderness, an intimate relationship with the earth and breath. French brings a softness, a roundness, sometimes a poetic modesty. Spanish, on the other hand, asserts a strength, an intensity, a very marked vital momentum. Our lives are traversed by these languages. Therefore, making them coexist in our music allows us to fully express our multicultural identity. Each song then becomes a space of passage, a place of sensitive translation between worlds.
P.-A. T.: When you revisit a traditional Andean song, how do you manage to maintain the balance between fidelity to heritage and creative freedom?
P. W.: Each of us has a musical "comfort zone," linked to her history. Lucie, for example, is intimately familiar with Argentine rhythms like the chacarera, the cueca, the zamba. Consuelo, originally from Ayacucho in Peru, carries within her the entire Andean repertoire of her region. Carole, for her part, has a very fine knowledge of Andean flutes and the charango. Moreover, she masters the repertoire associated with them. It is precisely in this mastery that creative freedom can be expressed with the most accuracy. Where tradition is deeply understood, it ceases to be fixed. It becomes fertile ground for invention, especially in our compositions. Thus, the heritage is extended rather than repeated.
P.-A. T.: The name Puka Wali, the red skirt, is full of symbols. What does it represent for you, both artistically and femininely?
P. W.: The red pollera embodies for us an assumed vitality, a joyful strength, carried by a contemporary and free femininity. The skirt, far from being a simple costume, becomes a manifesto: that of a body in motion, a plural identity, an affirmed presence on stage. Our differences in age, nationality, and background have never been obstacles. On the contrary, Andean music, and even more so, Andean music carried by women, has brought us together. What we want to convey is this audacity: that of joy, transmission, and freedom.
P.-A. T.: Your repertoire highlights composers often forgotten in the Latin American musical landscape. Why did this gesture seem essential to you?
P. W.: Because we are women, quite simply. We carry within us the necessity to participate in current movements. Thus, we contribute to the recognition and visibility of women in art. Each of us writes or composes. It seemed fundamental to us to highlight female figures of traditional music, often erased from official history. This choice is not militant in the strict sense: it is organic, deeply linked to our way of inhabiting music.
P.-A. T.: Consuelo, what does it mean for you to sing in Quechua in Europe, far from the Andean land where you were born?
Consuelo: It’s a question I had never really asked myself before. Today, I would say that singing in Quechua in Europe is to make a millennial culture exist. Indeed, it has survived oblivion and the fractures of history. I also feel how much Peruvians living in Europe need to hear this music. When they applaud me, when they cry listening to a wayno, they symbolically embrace their land, find their loved ones, return to life. And I, in return, let myself be transformed by this collective emotion, which shapes my soul as much as my voice.
P.-A. T.: Lucie and Carole, how does your European perspective nourish your approach to Andean tradition?
Lucie and Carole: Carole, the eldest of the trio, founded her first Andean group at the age of 13, with four young Belgian girls. Since then, her gaze has never ceased to turn towards South America. This is expressed through her studies in archaeology and her numerous musical projects. She lived through the 70s and 80s, marked by the success of Andean music in Europe. Moreover, the painful political contexts in Latin America deeply influenced the reception of these musics. Lucie, on her side, entered this tradition through the guitar and Argentina. As early as 2008, a theatrical project conducted with the poet from Tucumán, Miguel Ángel Sevilla, placed the poem Inti y Killa sun and moon in Quechua at the heart of the show, to evoke the otherness and complementarity essential to the Andean worldview.
P.-A. T.: Your music seems to be traversed by a very strong spiritual dimension. What inner landscapes accompany you when you play together?
P. W.: The natural timbres of our voices and instruments unite with great sensitivity. They evoke inner images, linked to our experiences, but also to those of the audience. During our first tour, we traveled through Germany, France, and Belgium. Indeed, these landscapes are very far from the Andean world. It is precisely there that meaning emerges: bringing other colors, evoking distant territories, offering a true sound journey, both intimate and collective.
P.-A. T.: In your opinion, can music repair, connect, or even heal, as suggested by the Andean worldview?
P. W.: We believe that all artistic practices—music, dance, poetry, theater—have a profoundly restorative power. In particular, this is true when they are conceived in a collective and shared presence. They develop an emotional intelligence essential to the balance of human beings. Andean music, through its close connection with nature and community, carries this capacity in a particularly strong way.
P.-A. T.: Your creative process seems very horizontal. How is this collaboration of three organized concretely?
P. W.: Each of us brings her background, knowledge, and also her vulnerabilities. Carole shares her vast musical culture and experience with Andean instruments. Consuelo ensures the accuracy of Quechua singing, phonetics, and the living memory of the texts, and she is the one who found the group’s name. Lucie, with her experience in Argentina, contributes her skills in arrangement, singing, and guitar. This constant dialogue allows us to evolve together, to surpass ourselves, and to create a project that fully resembles us.
P.-A. T.: Finally, if the audience were to leave with only one message after a Puka Wali concert, what would you like to convey to them?
P. W.: We would like the audience to "catch the virus" of Andean music. Thus, they would want to listen, play, and pass it on in turn. Moreover, we hope they participate in all the events that bring this culture to life. If our music arouses curiosity, joy, and the desire to share, then our mission is accomplished.
Interview conducted by our founder Pierre-Antoine Tsady at the Maison de l’Amérique Latine in Paris a little before the transition to the year 2026.