Spanish Young Music Talents: Javier García in New Orleans

As part of the Spanish Young Music Program, Spanish guitarist Javier García visits New Orleans in a new collaboration with Tulane University.

Spanish Young Music Talents (SYMT) is the new program of the Cultural Office of the Embassy of Spain in Washington, DC. SYMT has been envisioned to enhance and support Spanish young musicians’ careers, in collaboration with U.S. music schools and universities at a higher level (bachelor and graduate students orchestras), offering them an experience abroad.

SYMT aims to offer young musicians not only a concert or recital in the U.S., but a complete experience with complementary activities such as masterclasses, talks, conferences, etc. to broaden their opportunities and contacts. All visiting musicians are winners of the Juventudes Musicales de España national award and under 30 years old.

In this collaboration with Tulane University, Javier García will give a guitar recital together with Cuban-born guitarist Rafael Padrón as part of the New Orleans International Guitar Festival. Apart from the recital, Javier García will also be part of the Elías Barreiro Young Artists Competition’s jury.

Activities

• Concert: Javier García Verdugo & Rafael Padrón: on Thursday, March 30 at 7:30 pm.
• Young Musicians Competition: Wednesday, March 29–Saturday, April 1.

About Javier García

Born in Madrid in 1993, Javier García has received lessons from great masters of the guitar including Leo Brouwer, David Russell, Hopkinson Smith, Carles Trepat, Roberto Aussel, Eduardo Fernández, Zoran Dukic, Carlo Marchione, Roland Dyens and José Miguel Moreno. In 2015 he finished his studies of musical interpretation with honors at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Madrid, together with Professors Gerardo Arriaga and Tomás Campos, obtaining the Special Degree Prize. In 2014 he lived for a few months in Weimar, Germany, to study at the Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt with Ricardo Gallén. In 2015 he moved to Salzburg, Austria, where he studied with the highest grades the Master of Musical Interpretation at Universität Mozarteum in the class of Prof. Eliot Fisk.

García has been awarded in more than a dozen international competitions such as The Spanish Youth Musician Prize (2014), First Prize at the Gredos de San Diego International Guitar Competition (2014), First Prize at the Havana International Guitar Competition (2018) and the Leo Brouwer Prize at the Andrés Segovia International Competition (2020).

In 2017, his solo album Impresiones was awarded as “Disco Melómano de Oro” by the music magazine Melómano. His discography consists of 4 albums: Desideratum (2015), Impresiones (2017), Primo Tempo (2020) and Invocación y danza (2021). He has also made numerous recordings for radio and television.

His performances cover a large part of the Spanish geography, part of Europe, the United States and Cuba. As an orchestra soloist he has performed alongside conductors such as Albert Gonzálvez Cardós, Antonio Navarro Borsi and Mariano Domingo. He also performed alongside the OSCyL with conductor Eliahu Inbal. In the field of chamber music, García regularly plays in chamber groups like the Primo Tempo duo with clarinetist Carlos Orobón and the duo with soprano Natalia Labourdette.