The Florida Orchestra Announces Multi-Year Cultural Exchange with Cuba

June 1, 2011 - PRLog -- ST. PETERSBURG, FL – With Tampa Bay’s rich Cuban heritage and after several months of communications with Cuba’s Music Institute of Havana (Instituto de Músicade La Habana), The Florida Orchestra (TFO) has announced that it has initiated amulti-year cultural exchange with Cuba that will include members of the orchestra performing in Havana. The first phase of the exchange is September 26-29, 2011, which will be the first time since 1999 that a professional American orchestra has sent musicians to Cuba, and only the second time since the 1959 revolution.

Activities agreed upon thus far include an ensemble of principal musicians of The Florida Orchestra being invited to give a concert, lead master classes at the Amadeo Roldán Conservatory in Havana and make music with members of the National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba. As part of their visit, the musicians will also be taking donated musical instruments and accessories for the conservatory through a donation drive to be conducted by TFO this summer in the Tampa Bay area.

Subsequently, the Music Director of the National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba (La Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Cuba), Enrique Pérez Mesa, is scheduled to make his U.S. conducting debut on TFO’s Masterworks series on the 2011/2012 season, and TFO Music Director Stefan Sanderling has been invited to conduct the National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba (NSOC) in early 2012. Future aspects of the cultural exchange include featuring Cuban guest artists as well as Cuban composers’ works on upcoming Florida Orchestra’s Masterworks series in Tampa Bay; TFO principal musicians featured as soloists on concerts of the NSOC in Havana; and the goal of sending the entire Florida Orchestra to Cuba to perform as early as the 2012/2013 season.

Music Director Stefan Sanderling remarked, “Music is such a wonderful way to communicate with others, to remind us of our shared feelings and emotions as human beings. It does not matter if you speak different languages or if you are from different cultures. Music can touch people, it can move people, it can bring people together. That is an important part of our cultural exchange with Cuba.”

TFO Board Chair Thomas Farquhar added, “Many members of our community and around the state of Florida are of Cuban heritage with Cuban cultural traditions, music and foods as a part of their daily lives. Tampa Bay’s history has been enriched by strong ties with Cuba for well over a hundred years, including important Cuban writers, poets, architects, musicians and other artists visiting our area in the first half of the 20th century. As part of our cultural exchange, we hope that we can feature more Cuban composers’ works in our programming and even invite some of Cuba’s performing artists to share the stage with our orchestra.”

José Valiente, chair of the task force leading this initiative, said, “Part of this project is also an educational exchange. Our musicians will offer master classes at the conservatory in Havana and have interactions with the musicians from the National Symphony Orchestra. On our first trip this September, our Artistic Administrator David Rogers, whois a composer himself, will be meeting with Cuban composers and performing artists to seek out both Cuban music and artists that we would like to program on future concerts here. And hopefully, some of those artists will conduct workshops and master classes when they visit us. As a gesture of goodwill and as person-to-person diplomacy, we are organizing an instrument and musical accessory donation drive this summer for the Amadeo Roldán Conservatory to assist them in their music education programs.”

Summer 2011: Instrument and Accessory Drive for Conservatory
As a tangible token of friendship, the five principal musicians of The Florida Orchestra will be taking with them various instruments and accessories to aid students at the Amadeo Roldán Conservatory in Havana. The conservatory’s director Roberto Chorens said, “The Florida Orchestra’s kind offer to volunteer to assist the conservatory would be most appreciated by providing some instruments as well as instrument accessories to maintain the conservatory instruments for the students.” Towards this end, The Florida Orchestra is accepting donations of well maintained student instruments or professional instruments in good working order, as well as avariety of needed string and wind instrument accessories for the conservatory. To make a contribution, please contact TFO’s Angela Cassette at               727/362-5460      .

September 2011: TFO Ensemble Members Visit Havana
The Florida Orchestra will be sending a wind quintet composed of principal musicians to Cuba the week of September 26-29. With its concert program currently in development, the ensemble will perform a concert in one of Havana’s principal performance venues. The wind players will also offer master classes to students attending the Amadeo Roldán Conservatory in Havana. In addition, TFO’s visiting musicians are looking forward to an opportunity to make music with fellow musicians of the National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba. The TFO musicians going to Cuba include Principal Flute Clay Ellerbroek, Principal Oboe Katherine Young, Principal Clarinet Brian Moorhead, Principal Bassoon Anthony Georgeson and Principal French Horn Robert Rearden.

May 2012: Enrique Pérez Mesa Makes US Conducting Debut with The Florida Orchestra
In a markedly Latin flavored program, Music Director of La Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Cuba, Enrique Pérez Mesa, makes his U.S. conducting debut with Florida Orchestra Principal Timpanist John Bannon as the soloist in James Lewis’ Cuban-inspired Cubanitis for solo timpani and orchestra. The program includes two TFO premieres by Cuban composers: Carlos Fariñas’ Penthesilea: Preludio and Guido López-Gavilán’s Ritmotiv. Also on the program is Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 1, Classical, whose spirited balletic nature seems to be a perfect complement to the brisk dance rhythms of Mexican José Pablo Moncayo’s Huapango, which is considered Mexico’s second national anthem. These concerts will take place in 2012 on May 11 at David A. Straz, Jr. Center for the Performing Arts’ Carol Morsani Hall, May 12 at the Progress Energy Center for the Arts – Mahaffey Theater in St. Petersburg, and May 13 at Ruth Eckerd Hall in Clearwater.

Born in Matanzas, Enrique Pérez Mesa is one of Cuba’s most recognized conductors internationally. He is the music director of National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba (La Orquesta Sinfónica Nacionalde Cuba) and general director ofthe Symphony Orchestra of Matanzas (La Orquesta Sinfónica de Matanzas). His career as orchestral conductor began in 1991 working with the Symphony Orchestra of Matanzas, where he developed his conducting craft with Maestra Helena Herrera, participating in both national and international tours. In December of 2002, he was named adjunct director of La Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Cuba by Maestro Leo Brouwer. At that time, he also began to regularly conduct performances of the National Opera and was appointed as the musical director of the National Ballet Orchestra of Cuba. In that capacity, he began working with the internationally renowned Prima Ballerina Alicia Alonso on such major productions as The Nutcracker, Copellia, Swan Lake, Don Quijote and Carmen, as well as the world premiere of Ballet Tula with music by Juan Piñera and choreography by Alicia Alonso. His conducting engagements outside of Cuba have included concerts in Spain, Italy, Austria, France, Brazil, Mexico, Columbia, Chile, Ecuador, Venezuela and Costa Rica, working both with internationally renowned classical artists as well as a variety of important Cuban and international popular artists.