Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería, a pillar of symphonic music in Mexico during the last half century.

The work of Minería has not only been to build a sound of excellence to perform at the highest level the classical repertoire (including works that due to their technical and logistical complexity have been little heard in the country), but also to commission unpublished works to new generations of Mexican composers.

To exemplify this double contribution with which Minería has enriched the value and diversity of classical music in Mexico, we offer this brief account, divided into the stages of our artistic directors, which closes with the works that we premiered in this recently concluded Summer Season 2023, whose celebratory significance is to mark the first 45 years of the history of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería.

 

First stage: Jorge Velazco (1978-1984)

During the inaugural season, in the summer of 1978, Jorge Velazco, first artistic director of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería, invited León Spierer, then concertmaster of Herbert von Karajan at the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, to teach the musicians advanced training courses.

From this period, an innovative programming in the national symphonic environment stands out. Works rarely performed in Mexican theaters were presented, such as the Great Mass for the Dead by Hector Berlioz. Works by young Mexican composers were premiered, such as Sonatina by Manuel Enríquez and Ficciones by Mario Lavista.

Second Stage: Luis Herrera de la Fuente (1985-1995)

Luis Herrera de la Fuente was appointed artistic director in 1985 and proposed a more conventional programming, although he was equally concerned with presenting transcendental scores, such as Anton Bruckner's Seventh Symphony or The Poem of Ecstasy by Alexander Scriabin.

During this stage, important guest conductors, such as the Swiss Peter Maag or the Peruvian Carmen Moral, as well as outstanding instrumentalists -the Spanish harpist Nicanor Zabaleta, for example- and singers such as the Italian soprano Renata Scotto.

World premieres such as Night Drop by Carlos Sánchez Gutiérrez and Five Eleusinian Mysteries by Federico Ibarra Groth.

Third Stage: Jorge Velazco (1996-2003)

In his second period at the helm of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería, Jorge Velazco presented little known works by famous composers, such as March for the Coronation of Alexander III by Tchaikovsky or The Ruins of Athens by Beethoven. Among the guest conductors was Maxim Shostakovich, son of the mythical Russian composer.

Jorge Velazco died of vascular disease two days after conducting, during the fifth concert of the 2003 season, a particularly impassioned version of the symphony Haroldo in Italy by Berlioz.

 

Fourth stage: Carlos Spierer (2003-2005)

After the death of Jorge Velazco, the Swedish conductor Carlos Spierer assumed the artistic direction of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería. Works rarely programmed in Mexico were presented, such as The Song of the Earth by Gustav Mahler and The Ring without wordssuite on the tetralogy The Ring of the Nibelung tetralogy by Richard Wagner written by Lorin Maazel.

In the inaugural concert of his short tenure at the helm of the orchestra, Carlos Spierer handed over the baton to his father Leon Spierer to conduct Transfigured Night by Arnold Schoenberg as a symbolic tribute to the memory of maestro Jorge Velazco.

 

Fifth stage: Carlos Miguel Prieto (2006-present)

Since he was appointed artistic director in 2006, Carlos Miguel Prieto has distinguished himself by programming monographic seasons dedicated, predominantly, to one or two composers or to a specific musical style or nationality. The colossal "Mahler Cycle" stands out, in which during two seasons (2010-2011) all the orchestral works of the Bohemian composer were performed.

Commissions have been made to several Mexican composers, such as Gabriela Ortiz (Voltage Concert) or Enrico Chapela (Rotor), and unusual pieces have been performed: Gurrelieder by Arnold Schoenberg or Atlántidaa posthumous work by Manuel de Falla.

From 2006 to 2015, José Areán held the position of associate director.

In 2010, the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería, under the baton of Carlos Miguel Prieto, recorded for the Naxos label works by the Austrian composer Erich Korngold (among them the Violin Concerto, with the soloist participation of the Russian-American musician Philippe Quint). The recording received a Grammy nomination in the category "Best Solo Performance with Orchestra".

In 2022, the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería, under the baton of Carlos Miguel Prieto, recorded together with trumpeter Pacho Flores, the album Estirpe (2022; Universal Music), which seeks to renew the contemporary Latin American repertoire for trumpet and symphony orchestra with new works by Arturo Márquez, Daniel Freiberg, Paquito D'Rivera, Efraín Oscher and Pacho Flores.

 

Works premiered in Mexico during the Summer Season 2023 (explained by the composers themselves)

• Mexico City by Diana Syrse (1984), Mining Commission

Mexico City is inspired by the city, its sounds, its rhythm of life, its constant mix of intertwined stories, its places, its flavors and its mixed roots. The work begins by describing a giant concrete and metal monster. I imagine it as a giant waking up in the morning and walking with legs of buildings and a Metro, people, buses and cars as veins, its eyes, thousands of windows like those found in the hills of Iztapalapa. You hear a steady rhythm that begins to accelerate. In the second part I develop ideas that come from neighborhoods, colonies or avenues in particular. I imagine myself in a car driving through Tlalpan, I write how the voice of the avenue would sound if it spoke and I hear noisy sounds, a combination of machines, engines, wind, voices, thousands of footsteps and plastic sticking to concrete. In CDMX one feels an impressive energy of living, which is carried by every human being that walks on its skin of cement and dry soil. I write thinking of Coyoacán and its alameda, Churubusco and its streets, Tepito and its market, Reforma and its monuments, Xicoténcatl Park and every memory I have in some places of this city. A city seen from a visceral feeling that gives the public a vibrant music, with indigenous roots, modern, surreal, cosmopolitan and colorful. This work is dedicated to and inspired by the musical work of my father Fernando Valdés and is written especially for the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería..

• Porcelain of gold by Cristóbal MarYán (1992)

I consider porcelain to be delicate, but its creation process is quite the opposite. It is dynamic and raw. It is full of feet, hands, rock, water and fire. It is that dynamism that inspired me to try to represent that world musically.

More than movements, I would describe them as sections of the piece. My intention is to communicate the music that, as a result of the process of creating the porcelain, I imagined in my head, as well as the feelings that each part of the creation process provoked in me. The first section is contemplative and delicate; the second is almost graceful, but robust and powerful; the last two are a combination of dynamism and grandeur, for the creative act is always (in my opinion) grandiose.

• Altar of bronze, concerto for trumpet and orchestra, by Gabriela Ortiz (1964), a joint commission with international agencies in which Minería took part. Written specifically for the trumpet soloist Pacho Flores.

I had a long Zoom meeting with Pacho, which actually overwhelmed me more than clarified concepts. It is overwhelming to hear Pacho play like that, and in the course of our meeting he brought out and played about twenty trumpets. So much information overwhelmed me, but in the end it was useful. One of the consequences of that meeting is found in the last section of the work. Since this is a concerto tailor-made for Pacho Flores, there is a passage that the performer can play as written, or improvise. This is very much in keeping with Pacho's temperament and skill. The same goes for the cadenza; it can be played as written, or it can be improvised.