Arturo Márquez
Biography
Arturo Márquez (b. 20 December 1950, Alamos, Sonora, Mexico) is a Mexican composer.
He began his musical training in La Puente, California, in 1966, later studying piano and music theory at the Conservatory of Music of Mexico and composition at the Taller de Composición of the Institute of Fine Arts of Mexico with such composers as Joaquín Gutiérrez Heras, Hector Quintanar, and Federico Ibarra. He also studied in Paris privately with Jacques Castérède, and at the California Institute of the Arts with Morton Subotnick, Stephen Mosko, Mel Powell, and James Newton.
In recent years, Marquez has written a series of danzones, works based on an elegant Cuban dance that migrated to Veracruz, Mexico. His Danzon No. 2 is among the most popular Latin American works to emerge since the 1950s, enhanced by its use by Gustavo Dudamel with the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra in their 2007 tour of the United States and Europe. In February 2006, Arturo Marquez received the Medalla de Oro de Bellas Artes (Gold Medal of Fine Arts), the highest honor given to artists by Mexico’s Bellas Artes. That evening the concert El Danzon según Márquez (The Danzón according to Márquez) was presented at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. The concert included six danzons, all contained on a forthcoming CD.
Márquez has received commissions from the OAS, the Universidad Metropolitana de Mexico, the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico, Festival Cervantino, Festival del Caribe, Festival de la Ciudad de Mexico, and the Rockefeller Foundation. He has received grants from the Institute of Fine Arts of Mexico, the French government, and the Fulbright Foundation. In 1994 he received the composition scholarship of Mexico’s Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes. Márquez’s Octeto Malandro (Misbehaving Octet) was commissioned and premiered by Philadelphia’s Relâche Ensemble in 1996, and subsequently recorded by Relâche for Monroe St. Records. Márquez’s flute concerto, commissioned by the Rockefeller Foundation and the Consejo Nacional para las Artes, was premiered by James Newton. Other works by Márquez include En Clave for piano, Son a Tamayo for harp, percussion, and tape (featured at the 1996 World Harp Congress),Homenaje a Gismonti for string quartet, and Zarabandeo for clarinet and piano.
Works for Winds
- Concierto de Otoño para Trompeta (tr. Flores) (2018/2022)
- Conga del Fuego Nuevo (arr. Nickel) (2011)
- Danzón No. 2 (tr. Nickel) (1998/2009)
- De Juárez a Maximiliano (2006/2016)
- Paisajes Bajo el Signo de Cosmos (arr. Claessens) (1993/2012)
Resources
- Arturo Márquez, Wikipedia Accessed 25 June 2016
- Leyva, Jesse. "Conga del Fuego Nuevo." In Teaching Music through Performance in Band. Volume 11, Compiled and edited by Richard Miles, 518-525. Chicago: GIA Publications, 2018.
- Peer Music Classical
- Sotelo, Dario. "Danzón No. 2." In Teaching Music through Performance in Band. Volume 10, Compiled and edited by Richard Miles, 721-733. Chicago: GIA Publications, 2015.