BEL ESPRIT - ARTIUM SODALITAS
Preludios de la Noche (Night Preludes) were commissioned by pianist Angela Kim and are dedicated to her. Each prelude was composed at night and is inspired in a particular aspect or feeling of the night. The first one, Melancolía, is like a concentration of melancholy once the night falls on the soul. The second one, Misterio, conveys the mystery of the night. In this prelude there is the feeling of the passing of time and the feeling of the magical sounds after midnight. At the same time there is a pathos that approximates a dark feeling in the central section, like a funeral march. The third prelude, Lluvia, conveys the feeling of a rainy night, a slow and constant rain, a sort of spiral that involves us. The rhythm here is like a perpetum mobile of eighth notes that don’t stop until the end. The last one, Sueños, is the only fast prelude of the set and emulates the fantasy of dreams where things move fast and in unexpected ways.
Preludios de la Noche (Night Preludes)
I. Melancolía
II. Misterio
III. Lluvia
IV. Sueños
pianist Angela Kim
premiered at Armerding Recital Hall, Wheaton College
October 16, 2024
Lontano was written in 2023, and it is dedicated to the memory of Greek composer Giorgos Kouvaras who passed away in 2022. I met Giorgos at the Dvorak International Composition Competition in 2013 and we became good friends. This piece is a prelude that works as an elegy or funeral song conveying a dark pathos and an atmosphere of solitude. The harmonic language combines tonal and atonal sonorities and melodically the motive is a simple dotted rhythm that later on in the piece becomes incisive.
Lontano
dedicated to the memory of Giorgos Kouvaras
Michael Messer, piano
Armerding Concert Hall, April 11, 2024
Xavier Beteta
Of Maya and Portuguese/Spanish descend, Guatemalan-American composer Xavier Beteta studied piano at the National Conservatory with Consuelo Medinilla. At age 18, he was awarded the first-prize at the Augusto Ardenois National Piano Competition and third-prize at the Rafael Alvarez Ovalle Composition Competition in Guatemala. He continued his piano studies in the United States with Argentinean pianist Sylvia Kersenbaum and with Ukranian pianist Sergei Polusmiak. He also attended master-classes with pianists Massimiliano Damerini and Daniel Rivera in Italy. Xavier has performed in different venues in the United States, Europe and Latin America and has been a soloist with the Guatemalan National Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra Augusto Ardenois, and the Camellia Symphony in Sacramento.
As a composer, Xavier did most of his early studies privately with Rodrigo Asturias. In 2013 he won the Silver Medal at the fourth International Antonin Dvorak Composition Competition in Prague. Xavier studied music theory at the University of Cincinnati where his thesis was ranked no. 4 in the National Best-Seller Dissertation List. He later, obtained his Ph.D. in composition at the University of California San Diego where he studied under the tutelage of composer Roger Reynolds, the iconoclast American composer and pedagogue whose students are among the top composers in the country such as Chaya Czernowin, David Felder and Mark Applebaum to mention a few.
Xavier has been a composer in residence at the Naperville Youth Symphony and his compositions have been performed in diverse festivals such as Festival Musica in Strasbourg, France, Darmstadt Composition Summer Courses in Germany, June in Buffalo, SICPP in Boston, Opera Theater Festival of Lucca, Italy and by ensembles such as Accroche Note, Ensemble SoundScape, Ensemble Signal conducted by Brad Lubman, UCSD Palimpsest, the Mivos Quartet, Formosa Quartet, The San Francisco Contemporary Music Players under Steven Schick, the Guatemalan National Symphony the Camellia Symphony, The Naperville Youth Symphony, the Monterey Youth Symphony, and the Wheaton College Orchestra.
Xavier also holds a law degree from Salmon P. Chase College of Law and his diverse interests include cultural property, copyright, poetry, and tango. He is currently an Associate Professor of Music Theory and Composition at Wheaton College, serves as the Vice-President of New Music Chicago and is part of the board of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Latino Alliance.
More info on the artist
WEBSITE: www.xavierbeteta.com
