Carlos Fariñas was a Cuban composer. He was one of the most important masters of the Cuban avant-garde

Avant-garde

Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....

 in the 1960s along with Leo Brouwer

Leo Brouwer

Juan Leovigildo Brouwer Mezquida is a Cuban composer, conductor and guitarist. He is the grandson of Cuban composer Ernestina Lecuona Casado.-Biography:...

 and Juan Blanco.

He received his firsts musical orientations in the family. After that he moved to La Habana, Cuba, and was a disciple of the masters Jose Ardevol

José Ardévol

José Ardévol was a Cuban composer and conductor of Spanish derivation.As a child, Ardévol studied under his father, Fernando, who was a musician and conductor. He emigrated to Cuba in 1930, and from 1934 to 1952 was the director of the Orquestra de cámara de la Habana...

, Harold Gramatges

Harold Gramatges

Harold Gramatges was a Cuban composer, pianist, and teacher.Gramatges was born in Santiago, Cuba...

 and Enrique Gonzales Mántici. In 1956 he attended to the courses taught by Aaron Copland

Aaron Copland

Aaron Copland was an American composer, composition teacher, writer, and later in his career a conductor of his own and other American music. He was instrumental in forging a distinctly American style of composition, and is often referred to as "the Dean of American Composers"...

 on the Tanglewood Music Center

Tanglewood Music Center

The Tanglewood Music Center is an annual summer music academy in Lenox, Massachusetts, United States, in which emerging professional musicians participate in performances, master classes and workshops designed to provide an intense training and networking experience...

 in the United States. Between 1961 and 1963 he studied at the Moscow Conservatory

Moscow Conservatory

The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...

.

Fariñas also composed in several modern techniches and styles from traditional symphonic music to computer music. In 1989 he created the Electroacoustic and Computer Music Laboratory at the Art Superior Institute in La Habana, Cuba.

Notable works

• Muros, rejas y vitrales para orquesta (Walls, fences and windows for orchestra)
• Atanos y Tres sones sencillos para piano
• Oda a Camilo Cienfuegos (Ode to Camilo Cienfuegos)
• Despertar (Wake), a ballet
• Sonata for violin and cello
• String Quartet
• Tientos
• Diálogos (Dialogues)
• Relieves (Relieves)
• Hecho historia (Made History), a (ballet)
• In Rerum Natura
• El Bosque ha echado a andar (The Forest has begun to walk)
• Punto y Tonadas, para orquesta de cuerdas (Point and tunes, for string orchestra)