Experience Spain with Ana María Ruimonte

The Musical Instrument Museum in Arizona presents “Experience Spain,” a two-day cultural program with a variety of music and dance performances, talks, and workshops.

During two days, the museum will present some unique Spanish instruments as well as music and dance performances, talks, and other activities. All activities are happening Saturday and Sunday unless noted otherwise.

Craft: castanets

• 9:30 am–4 pm.
• South El Río.

Photo booth

• 9:30 am–4 pm.
• El Río.

Instrument spotlight: castañuelas

• 9:30 am–4 pm.
• Upper El Río.

Gallery talk: Spanish instruments

• 10:30 am–10:45 am.
• Europe Gallery.

Performance: Ana María Ruimonte

• 11:30 am–noon, Saturday.
• Main Courtyard.

As part of this cultural program, the museum will host the performance of Spanish singer Ana María Ruimonte, who will be featuring renditions of traditional zarzuela and sefardí songs.

Ana María Ruimonte is a lyric soprano born in Madrid, Spain, and naturalized American citizenship in 2017. She began the study of classical ballet when she was 5, ignating her interest in piano and classical music. She graduated in the Escuela Superior de Canto of Madrid in 2006. She worked at the Coro del Teatro Real and at the Coro y Orquesta Nacional de España, and sang for the Spanish King and Queen and for Nelson Mandela. She performed the principal role of the zarzuela Maravilla under the direction of Ana María Iriarte at El Retiro in Madrid. She was a finalist of the Giordano competition in Italy in 2013. She recorded several CDs such as Arded, Corazón, with Juan Carlos de Mulder and Adam Hunter, The Soul and Life of a Woman with Laurie Rogers, Rosas para Lecuona with Huberal Herrera, Sencillamente Martí with contemporary music by Aurelio de la Vega.

She wrote the multimedia bilingual theater spectacle with puppets and songs, set in the 17th Century in Spain and titled El Carro del Amor, presented in Spain, Philadelphia, at the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. and Havana. In 2016, Ruimontemet the maestro pianist Huberal Herrera at Havana and they started a superior artistic collaboration with concerts, recording of CDs and tours in Havana, Santiago de Cuba, Matanzas, Cienfuegos, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore. They appeared together on TV and radio interviews and in articles in the press to present their musical projects. Ruimonte presented the series Slavery, Miscegenation and Liberation in Philadelphia. She also performed at the Festival de Música Contemporánea in Havana in 2019.

Ruimonte and bassist Alan Lewine founded Soprano Meets Bass and performed in concert their programs 9 Centuries of music in About 1 Hour and Sephardic Treasures in Madrid, Sigüenza, Granada, Philadelphia, New York, New Mexico, Tel Aviv, Tucson, Ithaca, Pennsylvania, Havana, Belgium and Holland. The new disc Sephardic Treasures, recorded in Brooklyn, Spain and Israel, was recently released on the Ansonica label and it has been entered for a Grammy. She performed with the Arizona Opera during the 2021-22 season. She is awarded “Certified Artist 2022” by Classical Singer. She also collaborates in jazz projects with Alan Lewine Xtet while introducing the lyric soprano voice in the jazz scene.

Performance: Galician Bagpipes

• 11:30 a.m.–noon, Sunday
• Main Courtyard

Curator talk

• 12:30 am–1:00 pm.
• Event Room 2

Performance: The Flamenco Jazz Project

• 1:15 pm–2:00 pm.
• Main Courtyard

Workshop: Flamenco Dance

• 2:30 pm–3:00 pm.
• Event Room 2

Performance: Julia Chacón Flamenco Theatre

• 3:15–4:00 p.m.
• Main Courtyard

About the museum

MIM began with a vision to create a musical instrument museum that would be truly global. Realizing most musical museums featured historic, primarily Western classical instruments, MIM’s founder Bob Ulrich was inspired to develop a new kind of museum that would focus on the kind of instruments played every day by people worldwide. A focus on the guest experience shaped every aspect of the museum’s development. From the beginning, its goal has been to deliver a musical experience that is enriching, inspiring and fun. Today, MIM has a collection of more than 8,000 instruments from more than 200 world countries. The galleries reflect the rich diversity and history of many world cultures.