Jimmy López


Jimmy López is a classical music composer from Lima, Peru. He has won several international awards and pieces composed by him have been performed by leading orchestras around the world such as the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra of Peru, Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France. His works have been performed in prestigious venues such as Carnegie Hall, Sydney Opera House, Gewandhaus Leipzig, and during the 2010 Youth Olympic games in Singapore. His music has been featured in numerous festivals, including Tanglewood Music Festival, Aspen Music Festival, Grant Park Music Festival, Darmstadt International Course for New Music, and Donaueschingen Music Festival.

Education

During his childhood and early youth, Jimmy López studied at Colegio Santa María Marianistas, a catholic-marianist school in Santiago de Surco, Lima Perú. In 1998, López began studying at the National Conservatory of Music in Lima, where he worked with the Peruvian composer Enrique Iturriaga. In 2000 he moved to Helsinki to study at the Sibelius Academy with Veli-Matti Puumala and Eero Hämeenniemi. After being awarded a Master of Music degree, he was admitted to University of California, Berkeley from where he obtained his PhD in Composition in 2012. He has participated in masterclasses with Magnus Lindberg, Brian Ferneyhough, Michael Nyman, Jouni Kaipainen, Jonathan Harvey, Betsy Jolas and Marek Kopelent, among others.

Career

In 2004, a ballet, "Los Magos del Silencio" was produced in Lima and López's "Concerto for Koto and Orchestra" was performed by the Dutch UMA Kamerorkest. In 2005, a work for four recorder players and three percussion players, "Kraftmaschine", was commissioned by the German A*Devantgarde festival.
In March 2007, López presented several works, "A Wedding Blast", "Varem", "Epiphany" and "América Salvaje" at a concert held in Helsinki's Temppeliaukion kirkko. The compositions included use of traditional Peruvian instruments such as the pututo and the ocarina and inspired by Peruvian culture. "América Salvaje" was commissioned by the Ministry of Education on the occasion of the opening of the Biblioteca Nacional del Perú in 2006.
2013 saw the premier of four works by Mr. López: "Lord of the Air", cello concerto, performed by Jesús Castro-Balbi and the TCU Symphony conducted by Germán Gutiérrez; "Ccantu", for piano, performed by Priscila Navarro at her debut recital in Carnegie Hall; "Perú Negro", dedicated to Miguel Harth-Bedoya and the Centennial Season of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra; and "Warped Symmetry" by flutist Sami Junnonen during the Hanko Music Festival in Finland. His work "Synesthésie" was recorded by Pierre-André Valade and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in November 2012 for the radio program Alla Breve.
On August 14, 2015 an album dedicated entirely to his orchestral works was released under the Harmonia Mundi record label. The pieces included are “Perú Negro”, “Lord of the Air”, “Synesthésie” and “América Salvaje”, all of them performed by Conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya and the Norwegian Radio Orchestra.
His opera Bel Canto premiered in Chicago on December 7, 2015 at the Ardis Krainik Theatre of the Civic Opera House, home to the Lyric Opera of Chicago. Jimmy López is published by Filarmonika
The Chicago Sun-Times has called him "one of the most interesting young composers anywhere today."

Works

The date is the date of composition rather than publication or first performance.

Orchestral or ensemble