Pacho Flores launches ESTIRPE, his new record for Deutsche Grammophon label and the fifth on the yellow label, available from July, 29th on. Taking advantage of its presence in the summer season of the Minería Symphony Orchestra and Carlos Miguel Prieto for the American premiere of Historias de Flores y Tangos, by Daniel Freiberg, he presents this recording, which was made with the same protagonists in September 2019 at the Churubusco studios in the Mexican capital. This album features two outstanding guest artists, the Cuban clarinetist and saxophonist, Paquito D’Rivera, and the Argentine pianist, arranger, and composer, Daniel Freiberg, and already includes some of the concerts resulting from the project of shared commissions for new concerts for trumpet to outstanding composers that Pacho and his agency ACM Concerts have been managing in recent years and that has already added six new concerts to the repertoire and with a seventh in the process of composition.
The album opens with the Concierto de Otoño by Arturo Márquez, the first concerto of the project, premiered in September 2018 by the National Symphony of Mexico under the baton of Carlos Miguel Prieto. Along with the OSNM, the other orchestras participating in the commission were the Tucson Symphony Orchestra, which premiered it with its head José Luis Gómez; the Orchestra of the Performing Arts Center of Hyogo, Japan, with maestro Michiyoshi Inoue, and the Oviedo Filarmonía, with Lucas Macías. Next we find Crónicas Latinoamericanas, by Daniel Freiberg, a commission from the WDR Sinfonieorchester of Cologne, originally conceived for clarinet, which Freiberg adapted for trumpet as soon as he saw Pacho on stage.
The third concert on the album is the Concerto Venezolano by Paquito D’Rivera, also resulting from the project of shared commissions. In this case, it was the Minería Symphony Orchestra itself, again under the direction of Prieto, who starred in the Mexican premiere and participated in the commission together with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic orchestras, which premiered it with its current Music Director, Domingo Hindoyan, the Orchestra of Valencia, with Hernández-Silva, and the San Diego Symphony, with its head Rafael Payare. The last of the four concerts included on the album is Mestizo, by Efraín Oscher, which has a special meaning: Commissioned by the Children and Youth Orchestra System of Venezuela and premiered in Caracas in 2010 with the Simón Bolívar Orchestra and the direction of Domingo Hindoyan, it is the true antecedent of everything that came later with this project of shared commissions, as it was the very first concert composed for various instruments of the trumpet family, which later became a constant and a distinctive feature of Pacho Flores’s performances. The album ends with Morocota, a Venezuelan waltz by Pacho Flores originally composed for trumpet and guitar and included on ENTROPÍA, his second album for Deutsche Grammophon, with guitarist and cuatrista Jesús ‘Pingüino’ González, and later also orchestrated by Pacho himself.
After so an exciting summer that took him to Mexico with Alondra de la Parra’s Impossible Orchestra, to the Brass Festival Stuttgart, the Italian Brass Week, to Montreal as resident artist of La Virée Classique, where he played and conducted his own and other repertoire in three concerts with different formations; back to Mexico to Freiberg’s and to present ESTIRPE, Pacho Flores kicks off a sensational season with the Singapore Symphony with concerts by Haydn and Arturo Márquez. A 2022/23 season that brings important debuts for Pacho with orchestras such as the San Francisco Symphony, with Carlos Miguel Prieto; Los Angeles Philharmonic, with Gustavo Dudamel; Galicia Symphony, with Manuel Hernández-Silva; National Symphony of Colombia with Christian Vásquez; Quebec Symphony, with Anu Talli; Buffalo Philharmonic, with JoAnn Falletta, National of Cyprus, with Hernández-Silva; Belgrade Philharmonic, with Felix Mildenberger; as well as his return to the San Diego Symphony, with Rafael Payare; Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, with Domingo Hindoyan; or Tucson Symphony and Arctic Philharmonic, in both again with Hernández-Silva. In Liverpool and Galicia Flores will be artist-in-residence. He also continues with his project of commissions and premieres of new trumpet concertos, with the completion of the series of premieres by Daniel Freiberg with Arctic and with the Walla Walla Symphony; and the beginning of a new cycle with Altar de Bronce, by Gabriela Ortiz, which will premiere the orchestras of Galicia and Liverpool and whose premieres will continue in the 2023/24 season. In Liverpool he will also record a new album that will include, among others, the concerts Salseando, by Roberto Sierra, and the aforementioned Altar de Bronce by Gabriela Ortiz. He will also return to the Bogotá Philharmonic, National Philharmonic of Chile, and will maintain his presence in metal forums and meetings all over the world, as well as his didactic and pedagogical activities, among which his participation stands out, within their respective residences, with the Youth Orchestra of the Galician Symphony, and with the In Harmony program of the Liverpool Philharmonic.