Gabriela Ortiz is a Mexican composer whose music combines elements of folk, rock, African and Afro-Cuban influences, as well the avant-garde. Performed by María Dueñas, her new Violin Concerto ‘Altar de Cuerda’ features on the second release of Gustavo Dudamel’s Latin American series with the Los Angeles Philharmonic on Platoon. Here, Gabriela selects for us some of the best classical music from Latin America.
Best classical music from Latin America
Silvestre Revueltas: Sensemayá
This piece, based on a poem about a serpent by the Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén, really captures its rhythmic power and essence. Whenever I hear the opening, which starts with a slithering motif on the bass clarinet, I immediately imagine this serpent that is coming to bite me.
Revueltas wrote the piece after the Mexican Revolution of 1910, so it really belongs to the Mexican nationalist period. But unlike other nationalist composers, Revueltas managed to sound simultaneously Mexican and completely himself. He was a real genius, which makes it all the more tragic that he died so young, aged only 40.
Carlos Chávez: Tambuco
Like Revueltas, the Mexican 20th-century composer Carlos Chávez tends to be put in the ‘nationalist’ box. But because he lived much longer, he had time to absorb aspects of the European avant-garde. Tambuco, which he wrote in 1964, is a pioneering piece of percussion repertoire: really difficult to play, rhythmically complex and colourful.
The introduction is so original, starting with the sound of rattles. It just goes to show that ‘Mexican’ means more than wearing a sombrero and playing music centered around the theme of the fiesta; we do have complex music.
Alberto Ginastera: Piano Concerto No. 1
This virtuosic 1961 piece has a great combination of ingredients. On one hand, it’s very modernist and abstract, but Ginastera also had a nationalistic aesthetic, drawing on Argentine rhythms.
I love the particular way that this piano concerto mixes the folkish character with a sense of modernism. It creates a musical language that is very unique, very universal but at the same time very Ginastera, without ever sacrificing any sense of his characteristic intensity.
Heitor Villa-Lobos: Chôros No. 10
Normally, when you think of Villa-Lobos you think of his Bachianas Brasileiras, or his repertoire for guitar. But my personal favourite is this work for chorus and orchestra written in 1926. Villa-Lobos deploys the choir in a very onomatopoeic way, using hardly any words, to create something flamboyant, colourful and extrovert that really showcases Brazilian culture. I
t is direct and visceral – the kind of music you want to dance to. And it is so much fun, both to sing and to play.
Tania León: Inura
Tania León is a Cuban-American composer living in New York. She won the Pulitzer Prize three years ago and is an incredible promoter of Latin American composers. This 2009 piece for voices, percussion and strings is amazingly eclectic in its influences. The voices sound extremely contemporary and dissonant, but León also draws on the Afro-rhythmic features of Cuban music, using folk percussion instruments that classical percussionists often find hard to play.
Antonio Estévez: Cantata Criolla
Venezuela has a wonderful folk music tradition called Música Llanera, a key feature of which is the use of maracas. In this 1954 work for tenor, baritone, choir and orchestra you have a maraca player right at the front of the orchestra, which is so dramatic.
Plus, the narrative of the piece is great: all about a singing contest between a Venezuelan cowboy and the Devil. It’s basically a Faustian story, but told in a very Venezuelan way. I love this mix: the way that Estévez digs right into the roots of Venezuelan folk music and combines it with classical influences.
Javier Álvarez: Temazcal
The Mexican composer Javier Álvarez, who died recently, wrote this piece in the 1980s while studying music at university in London. It’s scored for maracas, electronics and tape – which, if you think about it, is a crazy combination.
And remember, this was written in the pre-digital era, when you had to physically cut the tape. But Álvarez does it so ingeniously, creating something that is theatrical, fun and totally unique. Check it out: you will never, ever see anything else like it.
Picture of Tania León: Getty Images