By Marie Elizabeth Labonville
Juan Bautista Plaza (1898-1965) was once the most very important musicians within the historical past of Venezuela. as well as composing in a number of genres and types, he was once the major determine in Venezuelan track schooling and musicology at a time whilst his compatriots have been trying to solidify their cultural id. Plaza's compositions within the rising nationalist type and his efforts to enhance musical associations in his domestic state parallel the paintings of contemporaneous Latin American musicians together with Carlos Chávez of Mexico, Amadeo Roldán of Cuba, and Camargo Guarnieri of Brazil.
Plaza's lifestyles and track are little studied, and Labonville's formidable e-book is the 1st in English to be in keeping with his wide writings and compositions. As those and different files exhibit, Plaza crammed a variety of roles in Venezuela's musical infrastructure together with researcher, performer, instructor, composer, promoter, critic, chapel grasp, and director of nationwide tradition. Labonville examines Plaza's many jobs in an try to check how the nationalist spirit affected paintings track tradition in Venezuela, and what alterations it dropped at Venezuela's musical landscape.