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| Paul De Castro's European Tour Pianist, composer and educator Dr. Paul De Castro has concluded a seven-city tour of Romania and Hungary, during which he led a six-member Afro Latin ensemble of musicians from Hungary, Romania, and the United States, conducted two master classes, and taught for a week at a summer jazz camp offered by the Tibiscus University School of Jazz in Timisoara, Romania. De Castro, who has also led master classes in Cuba, Canada and Taiwan, serves as the Afro Cuban expert on the International Association of Jazz Educators Resource Team. He says the interest in Afro Latin music continues to grow worldwide, and that musicians and schools of music in most countries take the genre as seriously as classical music or jazz. He is already planning a return tour of Europe in the summer of 2007. "Paul is a first-rate pianist, composer, and bandleader - creative, sensitive, and patient with jazz musicians for whom Latin music is somewhat unfamiliar", says John Reid, regional director of the Canadian Music Centre and jazz instructor at the University of Calgary. "He is also an excellent educator; his Calgary appearances had a tremendous impact with the junior high, high school, post secondary, and professional communities, and point the way for more development here with all of those sectors." Meanwhile, back in his home base of Los Angeles, De Castro has begun his fifth year as director of the Afro Latin Masters of Music program at California State University Los Angeles, the only program of its kind in the United States. Since its founding by De Castro in 2002, the program has attracted students from Taiwan, Japan, India, Israel, Croatia, Peru, Argentina, Puerto Rico and Mexico as well as the United States "We are fortunate to draw both permanent faculty and visiting instructors from a pool of outstanding Los Angeles-based Afro Latin musicians", notes De Castro. "And our library continues to grow because both students and faculty constantly contribute new compositions and arrangements. Our students are exposed to many different types of music and receive instruction in authentic performance practices from master musicians who have this music in their DNA." In addition to De Castro, who directs both the program and the Afro Latin Music Ensemble, the faculty includes Danilo Lozano, arranging, flute, improvisation; Robert Fernandez, Latin percussion, percussion ensemble; Pablo Mendez, violin; Raul Pineda, drums; James Ford, trumpet; Jose Arellano, trombone; Edgar Hernandez, bass; and Iris Sandra Cepeda, voice. All students take courses in Afro Latin percussion as a foundation for their studies in arranging, improvisation, history, literature, and either vocal music or their solo instrument(s) of choice. Thus far the program has conferred eight master's degrees and all graduates have gone on to recording, performing and teaching careers. One graduate, the internationally acclaimed jazz / classical / Latin violinist Lesa Terry, is now pursuing her doctorate at UCLA. The main 25-member Afro Latin Music ensemble consists of trumpets, trombones, saxophones, flute, vibraphone, piano, bass, drum set, three additional Latin percussionists, a four-piece violin section and a four-member vocal ensemble. Within this framework, the ensemble performs various types of Afro Latin song forms and styles including mambo, chachacha, timba, bolero, son, danzon, samba and choro. There is also a five-member percussion ensemble under the direction of Robert Fernandez and student-led ensembles of anywhere from six to ten musicians. "From the beginning, our program has attracted outstanding students and faculty, and the word continues to spread about the rich curriculum we offer", says De Castro. "I believe it goes without saying that anyone who intends to make a living as a professional musician in the years to come will need to have some familiarity with Afro Latin music, and right now this is THE place to get it." Born in Lima, Peru, pianist, composer and educator Paul De Castro started piano lessons at age 5 and continued his studies at the Conservatorio Nacional de Musica (Peru), Pasadena (CA) City College, California State University Los Angeles, and University of Texas at Austin, where he obtained his doctoral degree in music. De Castro has performed with saxophonist Gary Foster, percussionist Airto Moreira, and trumpeters Bobby Shew and Bobby Rodriguez, and was the founder and musical director of the Latin jazz group Rhubumba. In addition to the piano, Paul De Castro plays the Corneta China (Suona) in both Afro Cuban and Chinese settings. He founded and directs the Afro Latin Music masters degree program at California State University, Los Angeles and is the Afro Cuban expert on the International Association of Jazz Educators Resource Team. He has conducted master classes in Afro Latin music in Cuba, Canada, Taiwan, Hungary, Romania and the United States. His most recent undertaking, an outgrowth of his 2006 European tour, is Orquestra Dengue, an Afro Latin / funk / jazz septet he has assembled of musicians from Hungary, Italy, Peru, Romania and the United States. write your comments about the article :: © 2006 Jazz News :: home page |