Inspired by Music and More

Hello everyone. I think this is the third post where I talk about the last musical experience I had, but I feel inspired and excited by what we experienced in the staging of Bethoven's Opera Fidelio. For me it is necessary to praise the real protagonists of this opportunity, which are the young musicians and actors of the White Hands Choir. We have always been linked to them, but I think we have never had an approach like this.

To put it in context, I belong to a very important musical organization in Venezuela that has set the standard worldwide with its orchestras and choirs. We call this project El Sistema. Music is taught, but the real heart is in its social work. Children can enroll and in a short time they are assigned a musical instrument, so they become familiar with the instrument while learning the music. In addition, there are hundreds of núcleos all over the country, and each one of them has some orchestra and a children's and youth choir. In a country like this it is very difficult to acquire a musical instrument on our own, but in El Sistema not only do they assign it to you, but you have the best teachers in your region. (In the cover photograph I am accompanied by actors Yeison Escobar who played Jacquino, Jesús López, who masterfully played the role of Pizarro and José Gabriel, the actor who played Don Fernando).

I myself come from the nucleus of my city Maracay, where my parents enrolled me in childhood. I retired for many years, I really learned music in my family, and I have returned as an adult inspired by the passion of singing symphonic music. I was never interested in a musical instrument, but I was born to sing. Like all young people, I started in the choir of initiation, then I sang in the symphonic choir of my state. Then I moved to Caracas to study for my bachelor's degree and I also went through the metropolitan choir, until I reached my beloved Simon Bolivar National Choir; a group that shows that El Sistema not only trains great instrumentalists, since professional singing is part of our curriculum. In the picture on the left I am accompanied by Dodanim Castillo Aguero, the actor who gave life to the male protagonist Florestán, making a great and heartfelt interpretation of the same.

(On my right you can see the actor Gabriel Linarez, who played the role of Rocco in the Opera). In El Sistema there is a very beautiful project, which is the incorporation to music of children with special conditions or disabilities. For example, in my hometown there is a choir formed by children with special characteristics, and the first thing that surprised me about them was to see how they read their written music by passing their fingers over the paper. To give them a special characteristic, they wear white gloves, and it looks very good because they express the music with their hands through sign language. Even so, little by little the gloves are being used less and less, since the deaf community itself considers it inappropriate to a certain extent, because it is a way to distinguish them. In the picture below you can see Jennifer Gonzales who played Leonore and Yessica Motes de Oca, who played the role of Marzelina. These girls are all eminent and have been in the Manos Blancas Choir for years.

Particularly, I don't mix politics and society with music. I just enjoy and love to live from singing, touring and concerts. I admire my colleagues, the orchestra, the conductors and each of the musical training projects here. The boys you see in these photographs are the protagonists of Beethoven's opera Fidelio, which we have just performed with Gustavo Dudamel, and it is not the first time they have performed it; in fact, they have already performed it outside Venezuela and many years before us. I think it is beautiful that young people who have not had the opportunity to listen or speak can be part of a musical project, and I can tell you that they are excellent actors and very well timed on stage.