Biography:

Javier Álvarez Fuentes (8 May 1956 – 24 May 2023) was a Mexican composer known for compositions that combined a variety of international musical styles and traditions, and that often utilized unusual instruments and new music technologies. Many of his works combine music technology with diverse instruments and influences from around the world.^[1]

Life and career

Javier Álvarez was born in Mexico City on 8 May 1956^[1][2][3] to the architect Augusto H. Álvarez and his wife, Delfina Fuentes Ogarrio.^[4] His primary and secondary education took place at the Escuela Moderna Americana, the Jesuit-run Instituto Patria, and the Lycée Franco-Mexicain.^[5]

At the age of 18 he entered the National Conservatory of Music,^[5] where he studied clarinet with Francisco Garduño [es]^[6] and composition with Mario Lavista ^[1][6][7] He moved to the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee where he achieved a master’s degree in music theory and composition in 1981.^[1] He studied further in London, at the Royal College of Music with John Lambert^[6] and at the City University.^[2] He pursued a PhD sponsored by the Felix Mendelssohn Foundation, the Ralph Vaughn Williams Foundation and the London School of Economics.^[1] His first electroacoustic music dates from his student time in London, such as Temazcal in 1984.^[6]

Several of Álvarez’s works incorporate elements from Latin American dance genres, such as mambo. They have been performed throughout the world by orchestras such as the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the London Sinfonietta, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Mexico City Philharmonic,^[2] and the Orchestre National de France. He composed the music for Guillermo del Toro’s 1993 horror film Cronos.

From 1993 to 1999, Álvarez was a Fellow of Mexico’s National Endowment for the Arts and Culture. He was a founding member of Sonic Arts Network and served as the artistic director of the Society for the Promotion of New Music in 1993.^[6] He was a member of the music faculties, teaching composition and computer music, of the City University London, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the Malmö Academy of Music, the Royal College of Music, and the University of Hertfordshire.^[2]

After 25 years of living in England, Álvarez returned to Mexico where he served as Dean of the Conservatorio de Las Rosas [es] in Morelia, Michoacán.^[6] He then was a founding member of the musical arts department of the Escuela Superior de Artes de Yucatán^[3][6] in 2004, and from 2018 its director.^[4] He resided in Mérida, in Yucatán,^[6] where he was also active as a freelance composer and project animateur.^[8]

Personal life

Álvarez was married; he and his wife Daniela had two children, Tobías and Magali.^[1]

Álvarez died in Mérida on 24 May 2023, at age 67.^[1][3] Alejandra Frausto, the federal Secretary of Culture, credited him as a “musician and composer who never stopped creating, proposing and working for his community and for his beloved Mérida”.^[1]

Compositions

The first electroacoustic music by Álvarez dates from his time as student in London, such as Temazcal (1984). In this contemporary classic, Álvarez unexpectedly pitted a pair of maracas against a complex electroacoustic backdrop. Mannam (1992) takes its inspiration an ancient Korean zither called a kayagum. Winner of a Prix Ars Electronica distinction, the piece blends and juxtaposes elements of Korean music with materials and performance techniques drawn from the Mexican folk harp. The work Offrande (2001) offers an intriguing mix of Caribbean steel pans and electronically processed rhythmic patterns.^[6]

Several of Álvarez’s works incorporate elements from Latin American dance genres, such as mambo. In Mambo a la Braque (1991), he created an electroacoustic collage of musical segments drawn from Cuban mambo composer Dámaso Pérez Prado‘s Caballo Negro.^[6]

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