Antonio Lauro
Encyclopedia
Antonio Lauro was a Venezuela
n musician
, considered to be one of the foremost South America
n composer
s for the Guitar
in the 20th century.
, Venezuela
. His father, an Italian immigrant, was a barber who could sing and play the guitar so he taught his son what he could, but died when Antonio was still a child. After the family moved to Caracas
, Lauro pursued formal musical study (piano, composition) at the Academia de Música y Declamación, where the distinguished composer Vicente Emilio Sojo
(1887–1974) was one of his teachers. A 1932 concert performed in Caracas by Agustín Barrios
, the legendary Paraguayan guitarist and composer, so much impressed the young Lauro (already an accomplished folk guitarist) that he was persuaded to abandon piano and violin in favor of the guitar. From 1933, Lauro studied with Raúl Borges
(1888–1967), and was introduced to the traditional classical guitar repertoire
. In the next decade, Borges' pupils would also include Rodrigo Riera
, José Rafael Cisneros, and Alirio Díaz
. These colleagues, especially Díaz, were later responsible for unveiling Lauro's works to an astonished international audience, introducing these unheard works to the likes of Andrés Segovia
and John Williams
.
Like many South Americans of his generation, Lauro was a fervent cultural nationalist, determined to rescue and celebrate his nation's musical heritage. As a member of the Trio Cantores del Trópico in 1935-1943 (Lauro sang bass and played both guitar and cuatro
), he toured nearby countries to introduce them to Venezuelan music
. Lauro was particularly attracted to the myriad colonial parlour valses venezolanos (Venezuelan waltz
es) created in the previous century by accomplished national composers such as Ramón Delgado Palacios (1867–1902). Unfailingly melodic, alternately wistful and brilliant, and characterized by a distinctive syncopation
(created by a hemiola
in which two measures of 3/4 become a single measure of 3/2), such music was precisely the sort of folkloric raw material which the likes of Smetana
, Bartók
or Granados
had elevated to the category of national art in Europe.
A concert whose programme consisted entirely of such valses venezolanos (Venezuelan waltz
es) by the distinguished Venezuelan pianist Evencio Castellanos
(1914–1984) convinced Lauro that the guitar, too, should have comparable pieces in its repertory. Among his first efforts in this genre were the pieces later known as Tatiana, Andreína, and Natalia, composed sometime between 1938 and 1940; their instant popularity inspired still others. In addition to his guitar pieces, Lauro composed dozens of works for orchestra, choir, piano and voice; many of which remain unpublished. He occasionally experimented with modern compositional techniques, but most of his guitar music remains essentially on the Calle Real or "main street," an expression used by musicians of Lauro's generation to refer to a straight and direct route, without distracting harmonic detours.
In 1951-1952, the military junta of General Marcos Pérez Jiménez
imprisoned Lauro for his principled belief in democracy. Lauro later shrugged off the experience, telling his friends that prison was a normal part of life for the Venezuelan man of his generation. He had continued composing even in prison, and after his release immediately returned to performing with a pioneering professional classical guitar trio, the freshly formed “Trio Raúl Borges”. In the following decades Lauro's compositions were published, recorded, and performed throughout the world, and his contributions to his nation's musical life were recognized and acknowledged everywhere. Lauro was appointed professor of guitar at several distinguished schools including the Juan José Landaeta
Conservatory, and was named president of the Venezuela Symphony Orchestra
. In spite of his modest insistence that he was a composer rather than a performer, he was persuaded by his friends to embark upon a solo concert tour which began in Venezuela and culminated in a triumphant 1980 performance at London's Wigmore Hall
. Shortly before his death at Caracas
in 1986, he was presented with the Premio Nacional de Música, his country's highest artistic award.
, subtitled "al estilo del arpa venezolana" ("in the style of the Venezuelan harp"), is an extraordinary version of this energetic regional dance. Like the vals venezolano, the joropo makes extensive use of a hemiola
, in this case an alternation of 6/8 and ¾. The title of this work comes from the llaneros (inhabitants of the Venezuelan llanos
or plains) who approved of its insistent rhythm (6/8 = seis), thus giving it the right (derecho) to be so named. The next four pieces were classic valses venezolanos (Venezuelan waltzes): María Carolina (file info...), unpublished until 1983, named after the composer's first granddaughter. El Marabino refers to a native of Maracaibo
(a more common term is maracucho), an important city where Lauro himself lived for a time. Lauro once told his pupil Luis Zea that he had named a new composition María Luisa after his wife, and that the piece was as difficult as she was – a comment which later caused Señora Lauro to burst into laughter. In fact, it is a very romantic work, the second section of which was inspired by Chopin's
Waltz in A flat, Op. 69, No. 1. Angostura is the ancient name for Ciudad Bolívar
, Lauro's birthplace.
Lauro wrote the impressive Suite Venezolana, consisting of Registro (Prelude), Danza Negra, Canción, and Vals, during his imprisonment in 1951-52. The curiously named first movement, Registro, refers to the sort of improvising (registrar) a musician might do to warm up his hands or to explore a new or unfamiliar instrument; it is therefore equivalent to the Italian term ricercar
e as it was used originally used in the Renaissance. Lauro used the identical title for the first movement of his Suite para piano. The Danza negra is a very difficult piece, frequently selected as the main or final challenge in international guitar contests, demanding not only a mature technique but a solid command of intricate Venezuelan rhythms as well. It is mainly an Afro-Venezuelan dance which quotes a Venezuelan folksong named San Pedro; another popular tune, La Tumba, is quoted in both of the last two movements, a typical canción de serenata (serenade song) and a vals. In 1971 Lauro wrote the waltz El Niño, dedicated to his eldest son, Leonardo.
The first three of the Cuatro Valses Venezolanos (Four Venezuelan Waltzes) were composed in Ecuador
in 1938-40 while Lauro was touring there with the Trio Cantores del Trópico; years later, after the pieces had been published, Lauro decided to name them after his niece Tatiana, her sister
Andreína, and his own daughter Natalia, respectively. The last is by far Lauro's most famous work, commonly known as Vals criollo (the title under which it was recorded by Andrés Segovia
), or as Vals No.3 (the title under which it was published in 1963). The fourth waltz, Yacambú, is in rondo
form having curious chromaticism
s and unexpected harmonies; it was named after a picturesque mountainous area of western Venezuela.
El Negrito (referring to Lauro's youngest son Luis Augusto) and La Gatica (the kitten, a nickname for his wife) were published together in 1984; they were intended to be played as a pair. Lauro's Tríptico consists of three pieces in e minor which the composer collected together to comply with a request from Andrés Segovia
. The first of these, Armida, is a contemplative song named after the composer's sister. Madrugada ("before dawn") is an appoggiatura study inspired by one of Sojo's few original works for guitar. Lauro composed this piece in 1974, shortly after the death of his beloved maestro. La Negra was the nickname of Lauro's niece Armida, the daughter of his sister of the same name; this little waltz was composed in August, 1976.
Lauro's Variaciones sobre una canción infantil [venezolana] carries the dedication "Homage to the guitarists of the XIX Century;" that is, to Sor, Giuliani, Carcassi, and the others of their generation who loved the theme and variations form. The first half of the melody is the children's song Palomita Sentada, but the second half is original to Lauro, who found the little tune too brief to be developed successfully. Carora became a favorite of guitar virtuoso
Alirio Díaz; when Lauro invited him to title the piece, Díaz chose the name of his home town
(and that of his friend and fellow guitarist, Rodrigo Riera
), a city in Lara state
, in western Venezuela.
have set Lauro's fame in the honorific place he deserves. John Williams is quoted as having justly referred to Antonio Lauro as being the "Strauss of the guitar".
Another recording worth mentioning, "A Tribute to Antonio Lauro" by Thomas Cronin (guitarist), recorded initially for Irish National Radio on the RTE label, gained great appeal with Venezuelans worldwide.
Venezuela
Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...
n musician
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
, considered to be one of the foremost South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
n composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
s for the Guitar
Classical guitar
The classical guitar is a 6-stringed plucked string instrument from the family of instruments called chordophones...
in the 20th century.
Biography
Antonio Lauro was born in Ciudad BolívarCiudad Bolívar
Ciudad Bolívar is the capital of Venezuela's southeastern Bolivar State. It was founded with the name Angostura in 1764, renamed in 1846, and, as of 2010, had an estimated population of 350,691....
, Venezuela
Venezuela
Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...
. His father, an Italian immigrant, was a barber who could sing and play the guitar so he taught his son what he could, but died when Antonio was still a child. After the family moved to Caracas
Caracas
Caracas , officially Santiago de León de Caracas, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela; natives or residents are known as Caraquenians in English . It is located in the northern part of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range...
, Lauro pursued formal musical study (piano, composition) at the Academia de Música y Declamación, where the distinguished composer Vicente Emilio Sojo
Vicente Emilio Sojo
Vicente Emilio Sojo was a Venezuelan musicologist, educator and composer, born in Guatire, Miranda.- Biography :...
(1887–1974) was one of his teachers. A 1932 concert performed in Caracas by Agustín Barrios
Agustín Barrios
Agustín Pío Barrios , an eminent Paraguayan guitarist and composer, was born in the department of Misiones, Paraguay and died in San Salvador, El Salvador...
, the legendary Paraguayan guitarist and composer, so much impressed the young Lauro (already an accomplished folk guitarist) that he was persuaded to abandon piano and violin in favor of the guitar. From 1933, Lauro studied with Raúl Borges
Raul Borges
Raúl Borges Requena was a renowned Venezuelan pedagogue, guitarist and composer, mentor of several generations of Venezuelan guitarists.- External links :* * *...
(1888–1967), and was introduced to the traditional classical guitar repertoire
Classical guitar repertoire
To a greater extent than most other instruments and ensembles, it is difficult to compose music for the guitar without either proficiency in the instrument or close collaboration with a guitarist. As a result, a large part of the guitar repertoire consists of works by guitarists who did not...
. In the next decade, Borges' pupils would also include Rodrigo Riera
Rodrigo Riera
Rodrigo Riera , was a Venezuelan guitarist and composer. He wrote a vital and important body of works for the guitar, inspired by and dedicated to the rich music legacy of his region in the Lara state in Western Venezuela, displaying a loving nationalism that led him to be associated with the work...
, José Rafael Cisneros, and Alirio Díaz
Alirio Diaz
Alirio Díaz is a Venezuelan classical guitarist.The eighth of eleven children, Díaz was born in Caserio La Candelaria, a small village near Carora in western Venezuela. From childhood he showed a great interest in music. At age 16 he ran away from home to Carora, where he sought better schooling...
. These colleagues, especially Díaz, were later responsible for unveiling Lauro's works to an astonished international audience, introducing these unheard works to the likes of Andrés Segovia
Andrés Segovia
Andrés Torres Segovia, 1st Marquis of Salobreña , known as Andrés Segovia, was a virtuoso Spanish classical guitarist from Linares, Jaén, Andalucia, Spain...
and John Williams
John Williams (guitarist)
John Christopher Williams is an Australian classical guitarist, and a long-term resident of the United Kingdom. In 1973, he shared a Grammy Award win in the 'Best Chamber Music Performance' category with Julian Bream for Julian and John .-Biography:John Williams was born on 24 April 1941 in...
.
Like many South Americans of his generation, Lauro was a fervent cultural nationalist, determined to rescue and celebrate his nation's musical heritage. As a member of the Trio Cantores del Trópico in 1935-1943 (Lauro sang bass and played both guitar and cuatro
Cuatro (instrument)
The cuatro is any of several Latin American instruments of the guitar or lute family. The cuatro is smaller than a guitar. Cuatro means four in Spanish, although current instruments may have more than four strings....
), he toured nearby countries to introduce them to Venezuelan music
Music of Venezuela
The music of Venezuela is an expression of the Venezuelan culture, which contains diverse Music genres, traditional and moderns according with the features of each geographic region; although it is frequent to find different musical styles in the same region...
. Lauro was particularly attracted to the myriad colonial parlour valses venezolanos (Venezuelan waltz
Venezuelan waltz
- History :Between the hall dances that arrived to Venezuela during the 19th century, waltz has been the one of greater root and dispersion. Waltz consists of a musical expression derived from an Austrian popular dance, the ländler...
es) created in the previous century by accomplished national composers such as Ramón Delgado Palacios (1867–1902). Unfailingly melodic, alternately wistful and brilliant, and characterized by a distinctive syncopation
Syncopation
In music, syncopation includes a variety of rhythms which are in some way unexpected in that they deviate from the strict succession of regularly spaced strong and weak but also powerful beats in a meter . These include a stress on a normally unstressed beat or a rest where one would normally be...
(created by a hemiola
Hemiola
In modern musical parlance, a hemiola is a metrical pattern in which two bars in simple triple time are articulated as if they were three bars in simple duple time...
in which two measures of 3/4 become a single measure of 3/2), such music was precisely the sort of folkloric raw material which the likes of Smetana
Bedrich Smetana
Bedřich Smetana was a Czech composer who pioneered the development of a musical style which became closely identified with his country's aspirations to independent statehood. He is thus widely regarded in his homeland as the father of Czech music...
, Bartók
Béla Bartók
Béla Viktor János Bartók was a Hungarian composer and pianist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century and is regarded, along with Liszt, as Hungary's greatest composer...
or Granados
Enrique Granados
Enrique Granados y Campiña was a Spanish pianist and composer of classical music. His music is in a uniquely Spanish style and, as such, representative of musical nationalism...
had elevated to the category of national art in Europe.
A concert whose programme consisted entirely of such valses venezolanos (Venezuelan waltz
Venezuelan waltz
- History :Between the hall dances that arrived to Venezuela during the 19th century, waltz has been the one of greater root and dispersion. Waltz consists of a musical expression derived from an Austrian popular dance, the ländler...
es) by the distinguished Venezuelan pianist Evencio Castellanos
Evencio Castellanos
Evencio Castellanos Yumar , was a Venezuelan pianist and classical musician.Being born at the town of Cúa, Miranda state, son of Pablo Castellanos and Matilde Yumar, from young age starts his musical formation along with his father who was organist and kapellmeister at the Nuestra Señora del...
(1914–1984) convinced Lauro that the guitar, too, should have comparable pieces in its repertory. Among his first efforts in this genre were the pieces later known as Tatiana, Andreína, and Natalia, composed sometime between 1938 and 1940; their instant popularity inspired still others. In addition to his guitar pieces, Lauro composed dozens of works for orchestra, choir, piano and voice; many of which remain unpublished. He occasionally experimented with modern compositional techniques, but most of his guitar music remains essentially on the Calle Real or "main street," an expression used by musicians of Lauro's generation to refer to a straight and direct route, without distracting harmonic detours.
In 1951-1952, the military junta of General Marcos Pérez Jiménez
Marcos Pérez Jiménez
Marcos Evangelista Pérez Jiménez was a soldier and Presidents of Venezuela from 1952 to 1958.-Career:Marcos Evangelista Pérez Jiménez was born in Michelena, Táchira State. His father, Juan Pérez Bustamante, was a farmer; his mother, Adela Jiménez, a schoolteacher...
imprisoned Lauro for his principled belief in democracy. Lauro later shrugged off the experience, telling his friends that prison was a normal part of life for the Venezuelan man of his generation. He had continued composing even in prison, and after his release immediately returned to performing with a pioneering professional classical guitar trio, the freshly formed “Trio Raúl Borges”. In the following decades Lauro's compositions were published, recorded, and performed throughout the world, and his contributions to his nation's musical life were recognized and acknowledged everywhere. Lauro was appointed professor of guitar at several distinguished schools including the Juan José Landaeta
Juan José Landaeta
Juan José Landaeta was a Venezuelan composer.Born in Caracas, his parents were free mulatos...
Conservatory, and was named president of the Venezuela Symphony Orchestra
Venezuela Symphony orchestra
The Orquesta Sinfónica Venezuela was founded by a group of 26 professional musicians met at the invitation of the maestro Vicente Emilio Sojo following the dissolution on January, 1929 of the Union Filarmónica Nacional.This meeting took place January 15, 1930 in the Caracas Musical Declamation...
. In spite of his modest insistence that he was a composer rather than a performer, he was persuaded by his friends to embark upon a solo concert tour which began in Venezuela and culminated in a triumphant 1980 performance at London's Wigmore Hall
Wigmore Hall
Wigmore Hall is a leading international recital venue that specialises in hosting performances of chamber music and is best known for classical recitals of piano, song and instrumental music. It is located at 36 Wigmore Street, London, UK and was built to provide London with a venue that was both...
. Shortly before his death at Caracas
Caracas
Caracas , officially Santiago de León de Caracas, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela; natives or residents are known as Caraquenians in English . It is located in the northern part of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range...
in 1986, he was presented with the Premio Nacional de Música, his country's highest artistic award.
Popular Works
Seis por derecho: a joropoJoropo
The Joropo is a musical style resembling the waltz, and an accompanying dance, having African and European influences originated in Venezuela and performed in Colombia and Venezuela. It's a fundamental genre belonging to its typical music or música criolla...
, subtitled "al estilo del arpa venezolana" ("in the style of the Venezuelan harp"), is an extraordinary version of this energetic regional dance. Like the vals venezolano, the joropo makes extensive use of a hemiola
Hemiola
In modern musical parlance, a hemiola is a metrical pattern in which two bars in simple triple time are articulated as if they were three bars in simple duple time...
, in this case an alternation of 6/8 and ¾. The title of this work comes from the llaneros (inhabitants of the Venezuelan llanos
Llanos
The Llanos is a vast tropical grassland plain situated to the east of the Andes in Colombia and Venezuela, in northwestern South America. It is an ecoregion of the Flooded grasslands and savannas Biome....
or plains) who approved of its insistent rhythm (6/8 = seis), thus giving it the right (derecho) to be so named. The next four pieces were classic valses venezolanos (Venezuelan waltzes): María Carolina (file info...), unpublished until 1983, named after the composer's first granddaughter. El Marabino refers to a native of Maracaibo
Maracaibo
Maracaibo is a city and municipality located in northwestern Venezuela off the western coast of the Lake Maracaibo. It is the second-largest city in the country after the national capital Caracas and the capital of Zulia state...
(a more common term is maracucho), an important city where Lauro himself lived for a time. Lauro once told his pupil Luis Zea that he had named a new composition María Luisa after his wife, and that the piece was as difficult as she was – a comment which later caused Señora Lauro to burst into laughter. In fact, it is a very romantic work, the second section of which was inspired by Chopin's
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist. He is considered one of the great masters of Romantic music and has been called "the poet of the piano"....
Waltz in A flat, Op. 69, No. 1. Angostura is the ancient name for Ciudad Bolívar
Ciudad Bolívar
Ciudad Bolívar is the capital of Venezuela's southeastern Bolivar State. It was founded with the name Angostura in 1764, renamed in 1846, and, as of 2010, had an estimated population of 350,691....
, Lauro's birthplace.
Lauro wrote the impressive Suite Venezolana, consisting of Registro (Prelude), Danza Negra, Canción, and Vals, during his imprisonment in 1951-52. The curiously named first movement, Registro, refers to the sort of improvising (registrar) a musician might do to warm up his hands or to explore a new or unfamiliar instrument; it is therefore equivalent to the Italian term ricercar
Ricercar
A ricercar is a type of late Renaissance and mostly early Baroque instrumental composition. The term means to search out, and many ricercars serve a preludial function to "search out" the key or mode of a following piece...
e as it was used originally used in the Renaissance. Lauro used the identical title for the first movement of his Suite para piano. The Danza negra is a very difficult piece, frequently selected as the main or final challenge in international guitar contests, demanding not only a mature technique but a solid command of intricate Venezuelan rhythms as well. It is mainly an Afro-Venezuelan dance which quotes a Venezuelan folksong named San Pedro; another popular tune, La Tumba, is quoted in both of the last two movements, a typical canción de serenata (serenade song) and a vals. In 1971 Lauro wrote the waltz El Niño, dedicated to his eldest son, Leonardo.
The first three of the Cuatro Valses Venezolanos (Four Venezuelan Waltzes) were composed in Ecuador
Ecuador
Ecuador , officially the Republic of Ecuador is a representative democratic republic in South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and by the Pacific Ocean to the west. It is one of only two countries in South America, along with Chile, that do not have a border...
in 1938-40 while Lauro was touring there with the Trio Cantores del Trópico; years later, after the pieces had been published, Lauro decided to name them after his niece Tatiana, her sister
Andreína, and his own daughter Natalia, respectively. The last is by far Lauro's most famous work, commonly known as Vals criollo (the title under which it was recorded by Andrés Segovia
Andrés Segovia
Andrés Torres Segovia, 1st Marquis of Salobreña , known as Andrés Segovia, was a virtuoso Spanish classical guitarist from Linares, Jaén, Andalucia, Spain...
), or as Vals No.3 (the title under which it was published in 1963). The fourth waltz, Yacambú, is in rondo
Rondo
Rondo, and its French equivalent rondeau, is a word that has been used in music in a number of ways, most often in reference to a musical form, but also to a character-type that is distinct from the form...
form having curious chromaticism
Chromaticism
Chromaticism is a compositional technique interspersing the primary diatonic pitches and chords with other pitches of the chromatic scale. Chromaticism is in contrast or addition to tonality or diatonicism...
s and unexpected harmonies; it was named after a picturesque mountainous area of western Venezuela.
El Negrito (referring to Lauro's youngest son Luis Augusto) and La Gatica (the kitten, a nickname for his wife) were published together in 1984; they were intended to be played as a pair. Lauro's Tríptico consists of three pieces in e minor which the composer collected together to comply with a request from Andrés Segovia
Andrés Segovia
Andrés Torres Segovia, 1st Marquis of Salobreña , known as Andrés Segovia, was a virtuoso Spanish classical guitarist from Linares, Jaén, Andalucia, Spain...
. The first of these, Armida, is a contemplative song named after the composer's sister. Madrugada ("before dawn") is an appoggiatura study inspired by one of Sojo's few original works for guitar. Lauro composed this piece in 1974, shortly after the death of his beloved maestro. La Negra was the nickname of Lauro's niece Armida, the daughter of his sister of the same name; this little waltz was composed in August, 1976.
Lauro's Variaciones sobre una canción infantil [venezolana] carries the dedication "Homage to the guitarists of the XIX Century;" that is, to Sor, Giuliani, Carcassi, and the others of their generation who loved the theme and variations form. The first half of the melody is the children's song Palomita Sentada, but the second half is original to Lauro, who found the little tune too brief to be developed successfully. Carora became a favorite of guitar virtuoso
Virtuoso
A virtuoso is an individual who possesses outstanding technical ability in the fine arts, at singing or playing a musical instrument. The plural form is either virtuosi or the Anglicisation, virtuosos, and the feminine form sometimes used is virtuosa...
Alirio Díaz; when Lauro invited him to title the piece, Díaz chose the name of his home town
Carora
Carora is a town in Lara State, Venezuela, on the Morere River, a branch of the Tocuyo River. It is about 54 miles southwest of Barquisimeto. Carora was founded twice. The first time, in the year 1569 by Juan de Tejo, but due to constant attacks from the indigenous population, it was abandoned,...
(and that of his friend and fellow guitarist, Rodrigo Riera
Rodrigo Riera
Rodrigo Riera , was a Venezuelan guitarist and composer. He wrote a vital and important body of works for the guitar, inspired by and dedicated to the rich music legacy of his region in the Lara state in Western Venezuela, displaying a loving nationalism that led him to be associated with the work...
), a city in Lara state
Lara (state)
Lara State is one of the 23 states into which Venezuela is divided. The state capital is Barquisimeto.Lara State covers a total surface area of and, in 2007, had an estimated population of 1,795,100.- Municipalities and municipal seats :...
, in western Venezuela.
Legacy
The works of Antonio Lauro have long been very popular with guitarists worldwide, yet there have been few recordings devoted exclusively to him. However, several recordings by John Williams and David RussellDavid Russell (guitarist)
David Russell is a classical guitarist.-Biography:When Russell was five years of age, his family moved from Glasgow to Minorca, where he became interested in the guitar, imitating the likes of Andrés Segovia and Julian Bream....
have set Lauro's fame in the honorific place he deserves. John Williams is quoted as having justly referred to Antonio Lauro as being the "Strauss of the guitar".
Another recording worth mentioning, "A Tribute to Antonio Lauro" by Thomas Cronin (guitarist), recorded initially for Irish National Radio on the RTE label, gained great appeal with Venezuelans worldwide.
External links
- Photos
- Caroni Music - publisher of scores and CDs of South American music
- Antonio Lauro: una música afianzada en la tierra (Article by Alejandro Bruzual, Revista SIDOR Literal, Año 2, Nº 3, 1994)
- Biography in Spanish
- Antonio Lauro playing "María Cristina" on YouTube
- Venezuelan Guitarist Humberto Bruni playing "Seis por Derecho" on YouTube
- Venezuelan Guitarist Humberto Bruni playing Natalia on YouTube
See also
- Music of VenezuelaMusic of VenezuelaThe music of Venezuela is an expression of the Venezuelan culture, which contains diverse Music genres, traditional and moderns according with the features of each geographic region; although it is frequent to find different musical styles in the same region...
- WaltzWaltzThe waltz is a ballroom and folk dance in time, performed primarily in closed position.- History :There are several references to a sliding or gliding dance,- a waltz, from the 16th century including the representations of the printer H.S. Beheim...