Aperio, Music of the Americas continues its 2024-2025
season with a concert celebrating the remarkable influences
of Caribbean rhythm, poetry, and culture in contemporary music.

Combining elements from a variety of musical styles - including bomba, salsa, samba, and tango - Tropical Latitudes - Caribbean Currents in Contemporary Latin American Music sheds new light on the vibrant mix of culture, music, and history that distinguishes New World music from its European forebears. 

The performance begins with a set of piano solos by Gabriela Ortiz, Robert Berkman, and Scott Pender which employ the infectious rhythms of salsa and tango. Puerto Rican composer Christian Quiñones deconstructs the Afro-Caribbean bomba style - a genre traditionally improvised by drummers, singers, and dancers - in Loud Music for Quiet Places, his remarkable work for clarinet, violin, cello, and piano. Rhythmic elements also figure prominently in his string quartet Pasemisi-Pasemisa, which requires the players to employ body percussion and vocal techniques, while nodding to the influences of reggaetón, eighties music, hip-hop, and rock.

American composer Kevin Day presents a modern, experimental approach in his Ecstatic Samba written for flute, cello, and piano. The piece fluctuates between bouncing energy and more languid sections, reminiscent of changing moods prevalent in the music of Argentinian composer Astor Piazzolla, whose perennial milonga, Oblivion, Day has also arranged in a new version for string quartet and soprano. 

The late Robert Avalon’s stunning Sextet to Julia de Burgos scored for soprano, winds, strings and piano rounds out this exhilarating program.                             

PROGRAM
AVALON Sextet to Julia de Burgos
BERKMAN Thorn-Torn Lips 
DAY Ecstatic Samba
ORTIZ Suy-Muy-Key
PENDER Ms. Jackson Dances for the People 
PIAZZOLLA (arr. DAY) Oblivion 
QUIÑONES Loud Music for Quiet Places; Pasemisi-Pasemisa

TICKETS
$35 General Admission / $25 Seniors / $15 Students