Juan Leovigildo Brouwer Mezquida (born March 1, 1939) is a

Cuban Cuban may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Cuba, a country in the Caribbean * Cubans, people from Cuba, or of Cuban descent ** Cuban exile, a person who left Cuba for political reasons, or a descendant thereof * Cuban citizen, a pers ...

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Def ...

, conductor, and

classical guitar The classical guitar (also known as the nylon-string guitar or Spanish guitar) is a member of the guitar family used in classical music and other styles. An acoustic wooden string instrument with strings made of gut or nylon, it is a precursor o ...

ist. He is a Member of Honour of the International Music Council.

Family

He is the grandson of Cuban composer

Ernestina Lecuona y Casado Ernestina Lecuona y Casado (16 January 1882 – 3 September 1951) was a Cuban pianist, music educator and composer. Life Ernestina Lecuona y Casado was born in Matanzas into a musical family. Her brother was pianist and composer Ernesto Lecuona ...

. His great-uncle, Ernesto Lecuona, composed " La Malagueña" and his second cousin, Margarita Lecuona, composed " Babalú", which was popularized by Cuban musician and actor

Desi Arnaz Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III (March 2, 1917 – December 2, 1986) was a Cuban-born American actor, bandleader, and film and television producer. He played Ricky Ricardo on the American television sitcom '' I Love Lucy'', in which he c ...

Music career

Early years

Brouwer was born in

Havana Havana (; Spanish: ''La Habana'' ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of the La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.

. When he was 13, he began classical guitar with the encouragement of his father, who was an amateur guitarist. His teacher was Isaac Nicola, who was a student of Emilio Pujol, who was himself a student of

Francisco Tárrega Francisco de Asís Tárrega Eixea (21 November 185215 December 1909) was a Spanish composer and classical guitarist of the late Romantic period. He is known for such pieces as Capricho Árabe and ''Recuerdos de la Alhambra''. He is often called ...

. At age 17 he performed publicly for the first time and began composing. Brouwer went to the United States to study music at the Hartt College of Music of the

University of Hartford The University of Hartford (UHart) is a private university in West Hartford, Connecticut. Its main campus extends into neighboring Hartford and Bloomfield. The university attracts students from 48 states and 43 countries. The university and ...

, and later at the

Juilliard School The Juilliard School ( ) is a Private university, private performing arts music school, conservatory in New York City. Established in 1905, the school trains about 850 undergraduate and graduate students in dance, drama, and music. It is widely ...

, where he studied under

Vincent Persichetti Vincent Ludwig Persichetti (June 6, 1915 – August 14, 1987) was an American composer, teacher, and pianist. An important musical educator and writer, he was known for his integration of various new ideas in musical composition into his own wo ...

and took composition classes with

Stefan Wolpe Stefan Wolpe (25 August 1902, Berlin – 4 April 1972, New York City) was a German-Jewish-American composer. He was associated with interdisciplinary modernism, with affiliations ranging from the Bauhaus, Berlin agitprop theater and the kibbutz mo ...

. In 1970 Brouwer played in the premiere of '' El Cimarrón'' by Hans Werner Henze in Berlin. Together with Morton Feldman, he was awarded a 1972 scholarship by the DAAD (

German Academic Exchange Service The German Academic Exchange Service, or DAAD (german: Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst), was founded in 1925 and is the largest German support organisation in the field of international academic co-operation. Organisation ''DAAD'' is a ...

) and to work as a guest composer and lecturer at the Academy of Science and Arts of Berlin. In Germany Brouwer also recorded a number of LPs for

Deutsche Grammophon Deutsche Grammophon (; DGG) is a German classical music record label that was the precursor of the corporation PolyGram. Headquartered in Berlin Friedrichshain, it is now part of Universal Music Group (UMG) since its merger with the UMG family of ...

Composing and performing

In his early compositions, Brouwer remained close to the rhythms of Cuban music, while later he was drawn to aleatoric music. During the 1960s and 70s, he became interested in the music of

modernist Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...

composers such as

Luigi Nono Luigi Nono (; 29 January 1924 – 8 May 1990) was an Italian avant-garde composer of classical music. Biography Early years Nono, born in Venice, was a member of a wealthy artistic family; his grandfather was a notable painter. Nono beg ...

and

Iannis Xenakis Giannis Klearchou Xenakis (also spelled for professional purposes as Yannis or Iannis Xenakis; el, Γιάννης "Ιωάννης" Κλέαρχου Ξενάκης, ; 29 May 1922 – 4 February 2001) was a Romanian-born Greek-French avant-garde c ...

, using indeterminacy in works such as ''Sonograma I''. Other works from this period include the guitar pieces ''Canticum'' (1968), ''La espiral eterna'' (1971), ''Parábola'' (1973) and ''Tarantos'' (1974). More recently, Brouwer's works have leaned towards

tonality Tonality is the arrangement of pitches and/or chords of a musical work in a hierarchy of perceived relations, stabilities, attractions and directionality. In this hierarchy, the single pitch or triadic chord with the greatest stability is ca ...

and

modality Modality may refer to: Humanities * Modality (theology), the organization and structure of the church, as distinct from sodality or parachurch organizations * Modality (music), in music, the subject concerning certain diatonic scales * Modaliti ...

. The solo guitar works ''El Decamerón Negro'' (1981), ''Paisaje cubano con campanas'' (1986), and the ''Sonata'' (1990; for

Julian Bream Julian Alexander Bream (15 July 193314 August 2020) was an English classical guitarist and lutenist. Regarded as one of the most distinguished classical guitarists of the 20th century, he played a significant role in improving the public perce ...

) exemplify this tendency. His playing career ended in the early 1980s due to an injury to a tendon in his right hand middle finger. Brouwer has written for guitar, piano, and percussion, and has composed orchestral works, ballet, and music for over one hundred movies, including the film '' Like Water for Chocolate''. For a guitar competition in Hungary in 1979, he wrote a composition that employed 200 guitarists. He is known for a series of studies called the Etudes Simples. Brouwer has also transcribed Beatles songs for classical guitar. He has performed and recorded works by Sylvano Bussotti, Hans Werner Henze,

Maurice Ohana Maurice Ohana (12 June 1913 – 13 November 1992) was a French composer. Ohana's output includes choral works, string quartets, suites for ten-string guitar, a ''Tiento'' for six-string guitar, and operas. Life and career Ohana was born in Casab ...

Cristóbal Halffter Cristóbal Halffter Jiménez-Encina (24 March 1930 – 23 May 2021) was a Spanish classical composer. He was the nephew of two other composers, Rodolfo and Ernesto Halffter and is regarded as the most important Spanish composer of the gene ...

, Leni Alexander,

Cornelius Cardew Cornelius Cardew (7 May 193613 December 1981) was an English experimental music composer, and founder (with Howard Skempton and Michael Parsons) of the Scratch Orchestra, an experimental performing ensemble. He later rejected experimental music, ...

, and

Heitor Villa-Lobos Heitor Villa-Lobos (March 5, 1887November 17, 1959) was a Brazilian composer, conductor, cellist, and classical guitarist described as "the single most significant creative figure in 20th-century Brazilian art music". Villa-Lobos has become the ...

Other activities

He has been a conductor for many symphony orchestras, including the BBC Concert Orchestra, the

Berlin Philharmonic The Berlin Philharmonic (german: Berliner Philharmoniker, links=no, italic=no) is a German orchestra based in Berlin. It is one of the most popular, acclaimed and well-respected orchestras in the world. History The Berlin Philharmonic was fo ...

, and the Cordoba Symphony in Spain. Brouwer is involved in the Concurso y Festival Internacional de Guitarra de la Habana (Havana International Guitar Festival and Competition). He frequently travels to attend guitar festivals throughout the world, and especially to other Latin American countries. Brouwer, according to the composer himself, has never been a member of the Communist Party of Cuba, but has nevertheless held a number of official posts in Cuba, including with the music department of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry. Brouwer is the great-uncle of Al Jourgensen of Ministry fame. Brouwer is the brother of Jourgensen's maternal grandfather.

Selected compositions

Chamber and solo instrumental * 2009 '' Mitología de las Aguas'' (''Sonata No. 1 for flute and guitar'') Film scores * 1968: '' Lucía'' * 1992: ''

Like Water for Chocolate (film) ''Like Water for Chocolate'' (Spanish: ''Como agua para chocolate'') is a 1992 Mexican romantic drama film in the style of magical realism based on the novel, published in 1989 by first-time Mexican novelist Laura Esquivel. It earned ten Arie ...

References

Other sources

*Andy Daly,
Leo Brouwer
'. Music Web International, accessed June 9, 2011 * *