He has never won a major piano competition probably because he has never entered one. During his studies at the Marshall Academy he read the complete Don Quijote by Cervantes. This did not improve his piano playing but did make him feel superior to his colleagues who practiced more than he did.
He has been known to play exceptionally well and impress many people. This at times can be sacrificed especially if friends, museums or spectacular sunsets occur or diner with friends and good wine are involved, as he firmly believes life is to be lived not practiced.
He enjoys working with singers because he loves poetry. He has worked with many famous singers like Nancy Herrera, Veronica Villarroel or Norah Amsellem and others who are less famous and just as great.
He studied with Alicia de Larrocha and Carlota Garriga at the Marshall Academy,(founded by Enrique Granados in 1901) in Barcelona. Alicia was very hard on him but that was logical as she was never pleased with how she played and she was really good! Carlota had a different approach that started with “it’s not so bad” which somehow always made him feel better.
He was born in Florida but that’s not important because he couldn’t play the piano when he was born.
He has never played with the New York Philharmonic or the Berlin Philharmonic and is not sure he wants to as he has developed an allergy to conductors and orchestras (there are a few exceptions).
He really loves to teach and likes most but not all of his students. He teaches at the National University of Colombia (the country in South America)
He has very famous friends, semi famous friends, and friends who are only famous to their mother and he likes them all the same.
He enjoys cooking and loves to eat out with no preference between luxury restaurants or a hole in the wall as long as the company and food are good.
He loves new music and prefers to call it new music because calling it contemporary music tends to have a similar effect as the pandemic. Along with everything Catalan
(and Spanish) Haydn, Mozart, Brahms and Debussy are his favorites! He respects Beethoven but rarely performs Beethoven as it gives him a rash.
He loves chamber music as it always provides excellent dining company after concerts.
He has a Steinway but plays on whatever piano the hall has basically because he can’t afford to take his Steinway piano with him.
He doesn’t rent halls to play in because what’s the point. He hasn’t played Rachmaninov third or Prokofiev second and has no plans to do so.
He has recorded lots of cds, that people in Helsinki and Saigon listen to (and a few other trendy places.) He enjoys recording and somehow knowing you can repeat somehow makes it seem less stressful and it’s proof he practices. That proof is on many digital platforms.
He is friendly… say hello.
He was director of the first Medellín International Festival and director of the Festival d'Estiu in Sitges. He has organized two weeks of Catalan culture with the EAFIT University and the University of Antioquia and in collaboration with the Bolivar Foundation in Quito, Ecuador.
He performs frequently in Spain and Europe. Thus he made his debut at the Perelada International Festival in an avant garde production by Carlos Santos of Rossini's Barber of Seville. He has performed at the festivals of Camprodon, Torella de Montgri, Girona, Pals, Alicante, Madrid, Granada, Dusseldorf, Munich.
He returns to the United States two or three times a year to give concerts and master classes at universities such as Michagan Ann Arbor and Kalamazoo, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Greenville, Queens College, University of Arizona and at conservatories such as Julliard School of Music. He made his debut in Sydney, Australia in 2013.
Since 2010, he has been associate professor and director of the Master's Degree in Piano Studies at the National University of Colombia. In August 2011, he was appointed director of the National Conservatory of Colombia, a position he held until July 2014. In 2012, the Master's Degree in Symphonic Conducting was founded and he was its director until 2015. In January 2013, he was appointed member of the board of directors of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá.
For the celebration of the Granados years 2016-2017, he gave recitals in Australia (April), in the United States (May), in Hungary and Spain (June), and in Argentina. In 2017, he gave performances in the United States, in Serbia, in Scotland and England, in Ecuador and in China.
