After her concert at the Palacio de Carlos V within the Granada Festival on June 22 with the premiere of the show ArteSonao, Marina Heredia returns to Germany as Martha Argerich’s guest. For the fourth time since 2018, the Hamburg Symphony organizes the already legendary Martha Argerich Festival in the Laeiszhalle from June 20 to 29, 2022. Artists such as Martha Argerich herself, Daniil Trifonov, Renaud Capuçon, Marina Heredia, Mischa Maisky, Sylvain Cambreling , Leonora Armellini and Sergei Babayan, as well as the legendary jazz fusion band Aka Moon, will perform six concerts in the Gross Hall and three in the Chamber Hall. The performance of the company of Marina Heredia will take place on June 28.
Tireless creator, great lady of today’s ‘cante’, Marina is one of the best things that has happened to Granada and the flamenco in the last century and is one of the most demanded singers internationally. One week after this presentation at the Granada International Music and Dance Festival, Marina, who made her debut this spring at the Berlin Philharmonie with the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, returns to Germany as she will be one of the great Argentine pianist’s guests.
Later this summer MArina will appear at the Lausitz Festival in Görlitz, in eastern Germany, in September she will return to the Bienal de Flamenco de Sevilla and will open the season of the Navarra Symphony Orchestra with its new director Perry So with El Amor Brujo by Manuel de Falla, in November she will visit the Pierre Boulez Saal in Berlin as a special guest of the mandolinist Avi Avital, and throughout the 2022/23 season Marina will be resident artist of the Duisburg Philharmonic Orchestra also in Germany, with two performances with orchestra and two flamenco shows. During this residency she will once again sing Falla’s El Amor Brujo, together with the orchestra’s Music Director Axel Kober, and will star in the world premiere of a new work commissioned by the orchestra from José Quevedo ‘Bolita’ and Joan Albert Amargós under the direction of Josep Pons.
Pacho Flores premieres the Concierto Mambí, trumpet concerto No. 1, by the Cuban composer Igmar Alderete with the Córdoba Orchestra and its Chief Conductor, Carlos Domínguez-Nieto. It will be at the Gran Teatro de Córdoba on June 16 and 17, 2022 and the program also includes the Concierto de Otoño by Arturo Márquez. Concerto No. 1, Mambí, for trumpet and orchestra, composed in 2010 for trumpet in B flat, revised between 2021 and 2022 and specially adapted for Pacho Flores and the variety of four-piston instruments he uses: trumpet in C, flugelhorn , high cornet in A, trumpet in B flat and piccolo trumpet in D. With a marked chamber character and reduced orchestration, its melodic and harmonic treatment is transparent, requiring great precision and balance. In the richness and rhythmic variety is where the author exposes with greater clarity the fundamentals of the concert, entitled Mambí (rebellious slave who fought against Spanish colonialism in the 19th century), it is a work of great virtuosity for the soloist, brilliant passages and difficulty technique, at the same time of deep expressiveness and lyricism in its second movement to the rhythm of Bolero in its central part, two cadenzas and moments of freedom for improvisation.
Igmar Alderete is a total musician, composer, classical and jazz violinist and arranger, born in Havana, Cuba, in 1969, he has been a violinist with the Córdoba Orchestra since 1994. His music gathers feelings and experiences that integrate new sonorities of great richness rhythmic, in a syncretism of resources that clearly reflects its roots: Afro-Cuban music, contemporary art music and popular music. Within its extensive catalog, his two concerts for marimba stand out, both premiered by Carolina Alcaraz, Concert No. 1 for clarinet, La Leyenda del Cimarrón, Nostalgia del Sur, Symphony No. 1 Influences, commissioned by the AEOS author foundation and the Córdoba Orchestra, directed by Manuel Hernández Silva, Esquemas Rotos or Bailando con arcos. His production of chamber music is also prolific with works such as Sones de America, for marimba, vibraphone and string quartet, Desafío concertante, for violin and saxophone quartet, the Suite Mosaico, for vibraphone, string quintet and piano, Introducción y Guajira for clarinet and string quartet, Aires del Sur, for solo clarinet, quartets, trios, etc. Soloists such as Paquito D’Rivera, Matthias Schorn, Vasko Vassiliev, Carolina Alcaraz, Katarzyna Mycka, Javier Nandayapa, Cuarteto de La Habana or the Trio Brouwer have premiered and recorded their works in forums such as the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival, Lincoln Center in New York , Cycle of Contemporary Music of Córdoba, Poland or Mexico.
This is the last of the lavish series of premieres that Pacho Flores has carried out throughout the course that is ending. The season began with the London premiere of Invocation, by Eleanor Alberga; in Bilbao he offered the premieres of the concerts by Arturo Sandoval and Arturo Márquez in their version for band, whose arrangements he himself made; the first premiere of Historias de Flores y Tangos by Daniel Freiberg with the Oviedo Filarmonía and Lucas Macías took place in Oviedo; then he premiered the Concerto Venezolano by Paquito D’Rivera in the United Kingdom with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic and Domingo Hindoyan, which shortly after had its Spanish premiere by Manuel Hernández-Silva and the Valencia Orchestra and later closed its cycle with the US premiere with the San Diego Symphony and Rafael Payare. Shortly after, the Brazilian premiere of Salseando, by Roberto Sierra, with the OSESP and Carlos Miguel Prieto took place, the cycle of which closed just a few days ago with the French premiere with the Orchestre National de Bordeaux and, once again, Manuel Hernández-Silva. Previously he had premiered his own flugelhorn concerto, Albares, with the Tenerife Symphony and Christian Vásquez; and, although on this occasion as a conductor and not as a soloist, he premiered with the Murcia Region Symphony the Concierto del Mar, for four Venezuelans and orchestra, by Leo Rondón, with the author in the solo part. In total, there are eleven premieres throughout the season, which continue this summer with the American premiere of Historias de Flores y Tangos, by Freiberg, with the Minería orchestra and Prieto, together with which he will also present his latest recording release in Deutsche Grammophon. Next season the two remaining premieres of Freiberg will take place, with the Arctic Philharmonic of Norway and Hernández-Silva, and the Walla Walla Symphony and Yaacov Bergman; and the process of premiering the new concert by Gabriela Ortiz begins, with the Spanish and British premieres, the Galician Symphony and Hernández-Silva and Royal Liverpool and Domingo Hindoyan respectively, orchestras for which he will be Artist-in-Residence throughout the season. This summer he will also be a resident artist at La Virée Classique, the festival of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, where he will offer three concerts, two as a soloist under the baton of Rafael Payare and another as a soloist-conductor leading the brass and percussion ensemble of the festival.
The Venezuelan Cuatro player Leo Rondón makes his debut at the Salzburg Pentecost Festival as part of the L’Arpeggiata ensemble, conducted by Cristina Pluhar, which will perform a program entitled Torre del Oro. The Salzburg Pentecost Festival has Seville as the central theme of its programming for 2022, which is celebrated between June 3 and 6. A new production of Il barbiere di Siviglia with stage direction by Rolando Villazón will open the festival with its director, Cecilia Bartoli, playing the role of Rosina, with whom she made her professional debut at the end of the 1980s. The concert in which the Cuatro player Leo Rondón participates will take place on Saturday, July 4 at the Haus für Mozart in the Austrian city.
About this program in which the cuatrista Leo Rondón participates, the festival says: On the banks of the Guadalquivir is the symbol of Seville, the twelve-sided Torre del Oro. For many centuries, the port in front of the Torre del Oro was the departure point for Spanish galleons sailing to South America and returning to Seville laden with treasure. But it also symbolizes the lively and enriching exchange between peoples and cultures. In this concert, L’Arpeggiata opens the golden door from the Old to the New World. The starting point of the musical journey is the music of Alonso Mudarra. The Sevillian composer (1508-1580) is one of the most important Spanish vihuelists of the 16th century, whose innovations in instrumental and vocal music were so significant that his work is still recognized today. Mudarra’s works were published in the collection Tres libros de música en cifra para vihuela de Sevilla in 1546. It contains variations of folías, tientos, pavanas, gallardas, romanescas, canzones, villancicos and sonnets in Latin, Spanish and Italian, which can be found among the oldest solo songs with instrumental accompaniment. From this collection the musical path leads to South America and the “living baroque” in the traditional musical culture there to this day. The Venezuelan cuatro, a key instrument in the Caribbean country’s folklore, is a direct descendant of the vihuela, and popular and traditional Venezuelan music is truffled with the aroma of both courtly and popular Spanish music, and its most characteristic forms, such as the joropo, descends directly from the fandango.
Cover of Cantos y Revueltas, with Flores, Rondón, the Real Filharmonía and Hernández-Silva
Cuatrista, guitarist, double bassist, composer-arranger and producer, Leo Rondón is one of the most outstanding representatives of his instrument who has performed in concert halls and festivals in Venezuela, Colombia, Portugal, Spain, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Sweden, United Kingdom, Belgium, Holland, Kazakhstan and Morocco, with different groups and in collaborations with artists such as Quatuor Debussy, Rolando Villazón, Emiliano González Toro, Richard Galliano, Didier Lockwood, Cristóbal Soto, Ricardo Sandoval, Alexis Cárdenas, Simón Bolívar Big Band of Jazz, Omar Acosta and Roberto Koch, Pacho Flores or Manuel Hernández-Silva, among others. As a soloist, he has appeared alongside Alexis Cárdenas and Recoveco in the show El Fuego Latino organized by the Orchester National d’Île-de-France and under the baton of maestro Alondra de la Parra, presenting seven concerts in the Parisian region, where they stand out the Philharmonie de Paris or the Opera Garnier. In Spain, he has performed with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra of Galicia, the Malaga Philharmonic Orchestra, the Navarra Symphony, the Murcia Region Symphony, the Extremadura Orchestra, the Valencia Orchestra and the Gran Canaria Philharmonic Orchestra, and among his next commitments are the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Arctic Philharmonic or Swedish Chamber Orchestra. He has participated in the album CANTOS Y REVUELTAS, by Pacho Flores, for Deutsche Grammophon, with the Real Filarmonía de Galicia and Hernández-Silva and has recently premiered his CONCIERTO DEL MAR for four Venezuelans and orchestra with the Murcia Region Symphony under the baton of Pacho Flores.
He won third place in the 2007 Siembra del Cuatro, and second place in 2012, as well as in 2011 as a cuatro player at the El Silbón (Venezuela) and San Martín (Colombia) festivals. He is currently a cuatrista, arranger and producer of the Ávila Quartet, a Venezuelan music quartet, as well as a cuatrista with the Ensemble L’Arpeggiata, directed by Christina Pluhar, Alexis Cárdenas y Recoveco, Venezuelan Roots and Joropo Jam, in addition to his solo project Leo Rondon Project. He organizes since 2010, together with the teacher Cristóbal Soto, the Summer Course Música Criolla Venezolana, a Venezuelan music teaching camp in the city of Mirecourt, France. Leo Rondón uses a cuatro made by Mathias Caron.
