International Guitar Festival - Cuarteto de Guitarras de la Ciudad de México & NOLA String Kings
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Free Admission with Tulane ID
Cuarteto de Guitarras de la Ciudad de México was formed in 2001 with the very purpose of performing contemporary Mexican music originally written for four guitars. Throughout its career, the quartet has performed in concert all over Mexico as well as in different countries in Europe and Latin America, within some of the most important festivals, which have included the world premiere of music dedicated to the quartet.
Apart from this, the quartet has made various broadcastings for several Mexican cultural radio and television channels. In 2011, as part of the celebration for its tenth anniversary, the quartet made the premiere in Mexico of Interchange, the concerto for guitar quartet and orchestra composed by Brazilian composer Sergio Assad.
Cuarteto de Guitarras de la Ciudad de México has published three recordings that have in common that each one of the pieces or arrangements they contain were commissioned by the ensemble to form interesting programs that contribute to the repertoire of this chamber formation. Jícamo a 4 (Urtext Digital Classics, 2005) has original music composed by five renowned composer-guitarists (Ernesto García de León, Juan Helguera, Julio César Oliva, Jorge Ritter and Gerardo Tamez). On the same page, ...a cinco (Clave Producciones, 2013) includes five chamber pieces for guitar quartet and a guest instrument (flute, voice, percussion, clarinet and live electronics) composed by Samuel Zyman, Jorge Sosa, Marcela Rodríguez, Jorge Ritter and Sabina Covarrubias. On the other hand, Sones y Danzones de Buena Madera (Tempus Clásico, 2014) is a showcase for Mexican music of traditional origin with brilliant arrangements for guitar quartet of popular sones jarochos, sones istmeños, and danzones, as well as symphonic music written by some of the most renowned Nationalist composers (such as José Pablo Moncayo, Blas Galindo and Arturo Márquez) which were also performed with twelve guitars made with Mexican endemic woods built by Abel García López, one of the most recognized luthiers in Mexico and worldwide. Speaking of this last production, in 2024 the quartet will celebrate the tenth anniversary of its release with a concert series which includes a tour in several festivals and universities in Texas.
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Along with its wide gastronomic diversity, Mexico’s music is one of its most distinctive features, as it serves as a social and cultural catalyzer, despite the variety of styles represented by the diversity of the groups that inhabit its vast territory. Of all the genres that depicts the Mexican soundscape, son and danzón stand out as appropriations of the cultural elements imprinted in the popular taste of the countryside and the city respectively. Of course, the echoes of these genres have reached the ears and pens of academic composers, who have stylized them and put them in the voice of many orchestras, in large-format creations. In its program Sones y Danzones de Buena Madera, we can hear the sounds that have echoed in the dance halls, in the fandangos and in the main concert halls of our country, in an adaptation for guitar quartet which gives back to many of these pieces that intimate sound and familiarity that characterizes this repertoire. Thus, in this program we can hear how traditional songs such as La bruja, La Sandunga and La Llorona, coexist with José Pablo Moncayo’s Huapango, Blas Galindo’s Sones de Mariachi and Arturo Márquez’s Danzón 2, having inbetween lovely danzones such as Elodia by Luis G. Jordá, Guateque by Manuel M. Ponce and Nereidas by Amador Pérez Torres.
