Today we’d like to introduce you to Arturo Rodriguez.
Hi Arturo, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I’m a composer, conductor and pianist born in Monterrey, Mexico. I started studying music at age eight and I have been composing music from the moment I learned how to read music. I left home when I was 15 years old. Studied briefly in Mexico City but then I got a piano scholarship and left for TCU (Texas Christian University) in Fort Worth, Texas. I mainly studied piano there but I also got involved with the University orchestra and started taking private conducting lessons. The first symphonic works I wrote was during this period and I was very lucky that my teachers would let me try out my new works with the University orchestra. My first orchestral work was premiered by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra while I was still an undergraduate in college and many orchestral commissions came after that. I continued my conducting studies at Butler University in Indianapolis and after that, I moved to New York City (2003) and have been a full-time composer/conductor/pianist ever since. I studied at the ASCAP Film Scoring Workshop in 2003 and was a Composer Fellow at the Sundance Music Institute in 2010. My passion has always been filmed (I also love photography) and film music and is the reason why I am in Los Angeles. I’ve had the pleasure to conduct the wonderful musicians in town for the recording sessions of high-profile films like It Chapet Two and Furious 7 while at the same time composing my own original work for orchestra and piano and traveling frequently as a guest conductor around the world.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It’s never easy and it’s always been hard work on a daily basis, but music is what feeds my soul and injects me with energy to continue forward. There have always been great moments along the way that also help me realize that I’ve taken the right path, like hearing my music performed at venues like Carnegie Hall or finding myself collaborating with the best orchestras in the area like the San Francisco Symphony, for which I’ve provided some orchestral music for several “Day of the Day” concerts, Or collaborating with Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Phil for “Noche de Cine” a few years a go or the “Power to the People” concert recently. I’ve also had the pleasure to serve as assistant conductor for John Williams, who is one of my musical heroes, several years ago for concerts with the Boston Symphony at Tanglewood. I’ve always treasured those moments and taken them as signs that all the hard work is for a reason.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
The symphony orchestra world is where I feel the happiest. I like to compose music mainly for the orchestra. My main instrument is the piano but I also studied flute when I was younger and got to play my first flute as an undergraduate with the University orchestra. I love conducting standard orchestral repertoire and in general, I enjoy conducting at all, but conducting my own orchestral works is what gives me the most pleasure. Loving the sound of the orchestra as an instrument, it was only natural that I got to work as an orchestrator for several composers here in town for film, tv and streaming projects but composing and conducting my own symphonic works is where I feel the happiest. At the moment I’m composing the music for the final episodes of season 3 of “Victor and Valentino”. A musical journey that’s lasted about four years. I scored a psychological thriller last year that should come out any moment now and just conducted a concert in Mexico with a program of solely my orchestral works. For that concert, I also wrote a piano concerto for myself which I had the pleasure to conduct from the piano.
The biggest thrill for me is the moment when I finally get to share my music with other musicians and with an audience. After spending hours, weeks or even months working on a new composition, that moment when you finally get all of that hard work back from an orchestra when you hear your new music for the first time causes an emotion and excitement that I will never be able to express with words. Also standing right there on the podium as a conductor, right between the orchestra and the audience when you are finally sharing your new music for the first time. I often think of myself as a bridge between the audience and the orchestra. A bridge that allows all that energy and emotion created by the music to flow back and forth between audience and orchestra. It’s a wonderful feeling I am very lucky to experience and never take for granted.
Even though I’ve been composing music from a very early age, there is little material out there available to listen, but that’s something I’ve been working on for the past year and have several albums right now lined up to be released soon of both, my piano solo music and my orchestral works. I’m also starting to compose a work that’s been commissioned by the Boston Pops Orchestra to be premiered this December. The work will be for narrator, choir and orchestra and is a commission I’m very excited about and extremely proud of. To me, the Boston Pops, currently led wonderfully by maestro Keith Lockhart, is also the orchestra for which maestro John Williams was music director from 1980 to 1993 and that connection and the fact that I’ll be composing original music for that same ensemble is very special to me and brings out and reminds me of Arturo as a child, waving his arms in front of the record player listening to albums of John Williams and the Boston Pops, or of Andre Previn as a piano soloist with the London Symphony conducting from the piano. Being able to remember childhood dreams and realizing that now is what I do for a living is a very special gift that life has given me.
We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
Everything. However, I do believe that good luck has to find you at the right moment and having worked and prepared enough so that the opportunities that come your way (mostly by luck) can be exploited at the maximum. It’s always an interesting balance of good luck and being ready to deliver at your maximum capacity but yes, I do feel like luck has a lot to do with it.
Contact Info:
- Website: arturosmusic.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/arturosmusic/
- SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/arturosmusic
Image Credits
Picture 1) Yimeng Yuan Picture 2) Alejandro Trigos
