URTEXT Festival will pay tribute to Mario Lavista one year after his death

The Third URTEXT Festival will pay tribute to Mario Lavista, Mexican musician, composer, professor and thinker, who died on November 4, 2021. One year after his death, the poster exhibition “Reflejos de la noche” will be presented at El Colegio National, from November 5, later with an inaugural concert on December 2 we will also see and hear “Jardín de piedra”, with music by Mario Lavista and choreography by Claudia Lavista, his daughter.

Mario Lavista was one of the most eminent current composers in Latin America and one of the most important figures in music of the second half of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st for Mexico and the world. Marisa Canales, director of the Mexican record label Urtext, describes that Lavista was one of the authors who decided to break with the colorful nationalism or music that presented a unifying narrative of the history of Mexico, “by moving away from that they begin to develop a cosmopolitan identity, based on a totally individual, libertarian voice, and also aware of all the techniques used in the international avant-gardes, particularly in the United States and Europe”.

He explains that at that time to be modern we had to transcend our borders “and Mario did it in an absolutely masterful way”. He was a student of Carlos Chávez, but also of Rodolfo Halffter, “that allowed him to have historical knowledge of composition and also rigorous analysis of twelve-tone music, then he traveled to France to continue learning and learning, this allowed him the freedom of improvisation with a range of techniques and languages.

Canales argues that Mario as a teacher followed that principle that governed his own path, freedom, independence and creativity, “always immersed in the deep knowledge of what is happening around him, that made his students find their own voice.”

stone garden

Claudia Lavista, daughter of the renowned composer, talks: “My dad had many edges and many boxes in him, a person who deeply believed in the discipline and that is seen in many of his works and collaborations. I was fortunate to grow up with him, surrounded by musicians, for me that was normal. I also inherited a way of working and relating to art”.

Therefore, as part of this tribute, Claudia Lavista will present “Jardín de Piedra”. “I am very grateful because I will be able to present this choreographic piece, with a solo, with the music ‘Cuaderno de Viaje’, which can be played for Cello or Viola”. The dancer Xitlali Piña and the cellist Jorge Andrés Ortiz Moreno will participate in this staging.

“Travel Notebook” was written by Mario Lavista on a family trip, when Claudia was 19 years old, “while we were on that trip my father was thinking about this work, and when he finished it he dedicated it to me. Many years later I did ‘Jardín de piedra’, the choreographic version of that work and I dedicated it to him. It is the only work that we dedicate to each other, so it has a very personal meaning”.

He said that it is the icing on the cake “and I really hope that it can move people, that it allows us to respond to this need to honor him, not only playing his music, but talking about him and inventing new ways for people to also discover new music. ways to meet him.

Claudia concludes: “My dad was a great weaver, or as a great friend would say, your dad was a great sower, now the rest of us are going to enjoy that forest, this tribute is one of the trees in that forest.”

“Reflections of the Night”

This is the result of a call from Poster’s Not Dead and Urtext Digital Classics, which invited national and international creators to be part of this collection; Proposals came from twelve countries (China, Cuba, South Korea, Italy, Poland, Turkey, Kosovo, Indonesia, Iran, Venezuela, Egypt and Mexico). Now 50 of them make up a transmedia exhibition, which by reading a QR code allows the public to listen to the composer’s music.

Reflejos de la noche will be exhibited at El Colegio Nacional, located at Donceles 104, CDMX Historic Center, from November 5, 2022 to February 2023. This is one of the special activities of the Third URTEXT Festival, which pays homage every year to a deceased composer and a living one with an outstanding career. That is why this December Mario Lavista will be remembered.

Edison Quintana will receive the second tribute in a ceremony where he will receive the Angela Peralta award for musical excellence. As a soloist at INBA and UNAM, Maestro Quintana has performed around five thousand works for solo piano, piano and orchestra, as well as participating in chamber music, jazz and tango ensembles. He has also been a soloist with all the important orchestras in Mexico and in many concert halls around the world.

About the URTEXT festival

The Third URTEXT Festival will be held from December 1 to 4 at the Franz Mayer Museum, El Colegio Nacional, the Interactive Museum of Economy (MIDE) and the Manuel M. Ponce Hall of the Palace of Fine Arts.

There will be four days of continuous activities with events for the whole family; more than 250 musicians will perform the best of Mexican music.

This event brings together the best artists in each specialty and genre; approaches different audiences through academic and artistic activities in the best conditions, either in privileged and historical scenic spaces or virtually.

For more information about the festival, you can follow the following links: https://www.masmexico.org/festivalurtexthttp://www.urtextonline.com/store/ y https://www.facebook.com/urtextonline

Nelly.toche@eleconomista.mx