Darwin Aquino Directs the Most Important Orchestras in Germany

Darwin Aquino Directs the Most Important Orchestras in Germany
Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic 2/17/2012

Young Dominican Orchestra Director, Darwin Aquino, began his 2012 musical schedule with an invitation to direct two concerts with Germany’s Mainz Philharmonic on February 15th and 16th. As director of the National Youth Symphony Orchestra of the Dominican Republic, Aquino said the two concerts in Phoenix Hall will be dedicated exclusively to Latin American and Dominican symphonic music.

As part of the musical undertaking in Germany, well-known Dominican pianist and teacher, María de Fátima Geraldes, has been invited to give Master Classes in Chamber Music accompaniment, piano and violin at the Kulturhof  Itzehoe. These classes will culminate in a gala concert in this northern German city.

“We selected a repertory that is representative of Caribbean and Latin American symphonic music which includes pieces from important Dominican, Venezuelan, Cuban, Mexican and Colombian composers. We hope the program will be well received by the public and the orchestra,” said an enthusiastic Aquino, honored to be the first Dominican to be invited to direct a first level German orchestra. While selected for his skill and experience, this is not the first time Maestro Aquino has worked in Germany, a country, according to him, with the best orchestras in the world.

An exchange of young musicians with the St. Georgien-Furtwangen Youth Orchestra followed by various concerts given by the Dominican National Youth Symphony Orchestra in 2007 are just a part of Aquino’s professional links between himself and Germany’s world of music. In 2008, Darwin Aquino realized his dream of participating in the Master Class Workshop with the famous Professor Colin Metters in Germany.  This great opportunity was made possible primarily through efforts made by the German Embassy in Santo Domingo which has maintained professional links with Maestro Aquino since that time. These links have led to the promotion and cultural exchange between the two countries and have contributed to the development of Dominican contemporary classical music.

As part of the musical undertaking in Germany, well-known Dominican pianist and teacher, María de Fátima Geraldes, has been invited to give Master Classes in Chamber Music accompaniment, piano and violin at the Kulturhof  Itzehoe. These classes will culminate in a gala concert in this northern German city.

Darwin Aquino’s career as an orchestra director is extraordinary in the national and international world of music as is his talent as a composer and violinist. His excellence is notable by his numerous invitations to direct concerts in such places as Harvard University in Boston, Virginia, New York, capital cities in Uruguay, Haiti, Colombia, Venezuela and his successful tour with the German Youth Orchestra. He was recently unanimously chosen as youngest composer named to be a “Numbered Member of the Latin American Society of Composers of Music and Art.”

Last November, 2011, in the Dominican Republic, he premiered in his “Cantata for Amansar la Muerte” in memoriam to the late Maestro Carlos Piantini, for soloists, choir and orchestra. He also gave his national premiere of Anton Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony.

In May 2012, he will direct the Alfredo de Saint Malo Festival Orchestra in Panama, where he will accompany the renowned American violinist, Rachel Barton Pine, in Jean Sibelius’s Concert for Violin

Aquino has won awards for his chamber music pieces in competitions in the Dominican Republic and Italy and has been published by Ars Publica Edizioni and France’s Société des Auteurs, Compositeurs et Editeurs de Musique (SACEM). His work has been played in Venezuela, Colombia, Miami, New York, Spain, Mexico and the Dominican Republic.