Camerata Romeu is an all-female instrumentalist chamber music group [1] founded and led by Zenaida Castro Romeu, [2] [3] orchestral director and composer from a family of Cuban performers and composers spanning several generations. [4] The orchestra's musical focus is playing European style classical music while drawing on the popular rhythms of Cuba [5] taken from Spanish, African and Latin American Indians.
Camerata Romeu toured Florida in 1998, and performed at the Respertorio Espanol. [6]
The group was nominated at the Latin Grammy Awards of 2003 [7] for the Best Flamenco Album and at the Latin Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition [8] in 2008.
Cinematic journalist, filmmaker and co-founder of Accent Media, Cecilia Domeyko, created a documentary of Camerata Romeu, entitled Cuba Mia: Portrait of an All-Woman Orchestra, [9] which in 2003 won the Silver Screen awards at the US International Film & Video Festival. [10] "
The ensemble performs regularly at the Festival de Música Contemporánea in Havana. Coverage of the 2009 Festival. [11]
In 2015, Camerata Romeu performed at the Festival Mozart Habana. [12]
The music of Cuba, including its instruments, performance, and dance, comprises a large set of unique traditions influenced mostly by west African and European music. Due to the syncretic nature of most of its genres, Cuban music is often considered one of the richest and most influential regional music in the world. For instance, the son cubano merges an adapted Spanish guitar (tres), melody, harmony, and lyrical traditions with Afro-Cuban percussion and rhythms. Almost nothing remains of the original native traditions, since the native population was exterminated in the 16th century.
Dionisio Jesús Valdés Rodríguez, better known as Chucho, is a Cuban pianist, bandleader, composer and arranger whose career spans over 50 years. An original member of the Orquesta Cubana de Música Moderna, in 1973 he founded the group Irakere, one of Cuba's best-known Latin jazz bands.
Francisco de Jesús Rivera Figueras, known as Paquito D'Rivera, is a Cuban-American alto saxophonist, clarinetist and composer. He was a member of the Cuban songo band Irakere and, since the 1980s, he has established himself as a bandleader in the United States. His smooth saxophone tone and his frequent combination of Latin jazz and classical music have become his trademarks.
Dionisio Ramón Emilio Valdés Amaro, better known as Bebo Valdés, was a Cuban pianist, bandleader, composer and arranger. He was a central figure in the golden age of Cuban music, especially due to his big band arrangements and compositions of mambo, chachachá and batanga, a genre he created in 1952.
The Amadeo Roldán Theatre is a theatre in Havana, Cuba built in 1929. The theatre was destroyed in 1977 by a pyromaniac; it was re-opened in 1999 as the head office of the National Symphony Orchestra of Cuba which performs seasonal every Sunday at 11:00PM.
Horacio "El Negro" Hernández is a Cuban drummer and percussionist. He has played alongside Latin jazz pianists such as Gonzalo Rubalcaba, Michel Camilo, Chucho Valdés, Eddie Palmieri and Hilario Durán.
Early Cuban bands played popular music for dances and theatres during the period 1780–1930. During this period Cuban music became creolized, and its European and African origins gradually changed to become genuinely Cuban. Instrumentation and music continually developed during this period. The information listed here is in date order, and comes from whatever records survive to the present day.
Antonio María Romeu Marrero was a Cuban pianist, composer and bandleader. His orchestra was Cuba's leading charanga for over thirty years, specializing in the danzón. Throughout his career he was popularly known as El Mago de las Teclas.
Descemer Bueno is a Cuban singer, songwriter, and record producer. His first professional gigs were playing bass with Cuban troubadour Santiago Feliú.
The Quaternaglia Guitar Quartet (QGQ) is a classical guitar ensemble from São Paulo, Brazil, founded in 1992. The Quartet has become a reference both for its artistic excellence and for its contributions to the expansion of the guitar quartet repertoire. Quaternaglia has developed a canon of original pieces and arrangements with the collaboration of a variety of composers such as Egberto Gismonti, Leo Brouwer, Javier Farías, Sérgio Molina, Almeida Prado, Sergio Assad, João Luiz, Paulo Bellinati and Marco Pereira Quaternaglia’s current members are Sidney Molina, Thiago Abdalla, Fabio Ramazzina and Chrystian Dozza.
Cuban culture encompasses a wide range of dance forms. The island's indigenous people performed rituals known as areíto, which included dancing, although little information is known about such ceremonies. After the colonization of Cuba by the Spanish Kingdom, European dance forms were introduced such as the French contredanse, which gave rise to the Cuban contradanza. Contradanza itself spawned a series of ballroom dances between the 19th and 20th centuries, including the danzón, mambo and cha-cha-cha. Rural dances of European origin, such as the zapateo and styles associated with punto guajiro also became established by the 19th century, and in the 20th century son became very popular. In addition, numerous dance traditions were brought by black slaves from West Africa and the Congo basin, giving rise to religious dances such as Santería, yuka and abakuá, as well as secular forms such as rumba. Many of these dance elements from European dance and religious dances were fused together to form the basis of la técnica cubana. Cuban music also contributed to the emergence of Latin dance styles in the United States, namely rhumba and salsa.
Telmary Díaz, better known as simply Telmary, is a Cuban rapper, musician, and spoken-word artist.
Zenaida Elvira González Manfugás was a Cuban-born American-naturalized pianist, considered to be one of the best Cuban pianists in history.
Armando de Sequeira Romeu is a Cuban musical director, composer, arranger, violinist, drummer and bassist. He is best known for his association with the Orquesta Cubana de Música Moderna, an Afro-Cuban jazz ensemble which spawned various successful groups such as Irakere.
Mágico: Carta de Amor is a live album by saxophonist Jan Garbarek, guitarist Egberto Gismonti and bassist Charlie Haden recorded in 1981 and released on ECM three decades later in 2012. The album follows the trio's first two recordings Magico (1979) and Folk Songs (1981).
The bowed string instruments have been always present in Cuba since its discovery, first as the viol or bowed vihuela and at a later time as the Italian violin. As other instruments and the culture in general, also the violin enjoyed in Cuba a period of great relevance during the 19th century. The violin was part of the instrumental ensembles that accompanied the Contradance and the Dance, the first Cuban musical genres, as well as other subsequent genres as the Danzón and the Cha cha cha. The violin also intoned some of the most beautiful melodies composed in Cuba, such as "La Bella Cubana" by José White. At all times, the Cuban violinists have been prominent representatives of the Cuban music throughout the entire world.
Rafael Machado is a Cuban violinist.
Pedrito Martinez is a Cuban percussionist, drummer, singer, dancer, bandleader, songwriter, composer, and educator. He was born and raised in Havana, Cuba. He is a Cuban Conguero performing classic Cuban Rumbas, Afro-Cuban folkloric and religious music. He is a Santería priest. He came to the United States of America from Havana in 1998. He plays the Batá drum, conga, cajón, timbale, and bongo drums, among other percussion instruments. Pedrito learned his craft from the streets of Havana, Cuba. He has performed with Paquito D'Rivera, Arturo O'Farrill, Brian Lynch, and Bruce Springsteen. He settled in the New York City - New Jersey area in 1998.
Ernesto Daranas Serrano is a Cuban filmmaker. Daranas' three feature films have had unprecedented success in Cuba and were submitted to the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film. Daranas is a Latin Grammy nominee for Best Long Form Music Video and a recipient of the King of Spain Award. His filmography includes Sergio & Sergei (2017), starring Ron Perlman, and Behavior, often considered the greatest Cuban film of the 21st century.
Cecilia Domeyko is a Chilean-American author, journalist, filmmaker, former broadcaster, and philanthropist based in Washington, D.C. She is the president and founder of Accent Media as well as the founder and director of the Mariposa Cultural Foundation. Her filmmaking career has become noted for winning awards and working with high-profile organizations including Univision, AARP, the Catholic Church, and the World Bank. Domeyko's career has been largely focused on raising cultural awareness and educating the international community through her films and authorship.