The President of Fundación Alhambra Guitarras José Botella, presented the International Guitar Excellence Award, in the Assembly Hall of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid, to Cecilia Rodrigo, President of the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation, an institution awarded with this award.
Different artistic personalities, academic intellectuals and the social and political environment, together with the large general public that filled the spacious and beautiful Hall, attended an emotional event that closed with the extraordinary interpretation of works by Maestro Rodrigo by the guitarist Ali Arango.
A historic day for the Guitar.
From left to right: Vicente Coves, José Luis Ruiz del Puerto, Cecilia León, Cecilia Rodrigo, Agustín León Ara, Tomás Marco, José Luis Turina and José Luis García del Busto.
The delivery of the International Guitar Excellence Award to the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation. The Alhambra Guitars Foundation prestige the Spanish Guitar throughout the world.
Assembly Hall of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid
The Alhambra Guitars Foundation awards the 'Fundación Victoria y Joaquín Rodrigo' the International Guitar Excellence Award.
The award will be presented on March 15th at the Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid, at 12:00 noon (Free entrance until full capacity is reached).
Presenting the event: José Luis Ruiz del Puerto, Director of the Alhambra Guitars Foundation and José Botella, President of the Alhambra Guitars Foundation. Receiving the Award: Cecilia Rodrigo, President of the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation and daughter of both.
The guitarist Alí Arango will put the musical finale to this event performing works for guitar by maestro Rodrigo.
The Alhambra Guitarras Foundation has announced the winner of the International Guitar Excellence Award, an award born in 2022 with the aim of rewarding and disseminating the work of excellence carried out by personalities, groups or public institutions or active private companies (performers, composers, associations, festivals, publishing houses, record labels...) in the field of Spanish classical guitar.
In this its second edition, this young but solid award has gone to the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation in recognition of its continuous work of research, documentation and preservation of the artistic legacy and dissemination of the work and figure of Joaquín Rodrigo, one of the most prestigious composers in the history of Spanish music of all times, with great relevance and presence in the field of guitar.
This was assessed by a jury made up of the nine members that make up the Foundation's Board of Trustees and directed by José Luis Ruiz del Puerto, who noted that:
"we are very happy to give the Award to a Foundation that dedicates all its efforts to preserving the figure and the work of a composer so important for the guitar. Joaquín Rodrigo is the author who has given the most international dissemination and visibility to the guitar with his works. Its importance in the history of music is undeniable and its guitar catalog is very extensive and of refined quality. I believe that the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation is the best formula to perpetuate the great musical work of this composer, born in Sagunto (Valencia), who completely conquered audiences around the world with his special way of understanding music, composing a catalog dedicated to the guitar, which is one of the most important and prolific works by a non-guitarist composer in the 20th century.”
The International Guitar Excellence Award of the Alhambra Foundation is an Honor Award for which the winning candidate will receive a commemorative statuette, as well as the organization's commitment to disseminate its work on the web, social networks and media, including its name and curricular reference on the Foundation's website.
The award ceremony will take place on March 15 at 12 noon at the Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid, chaired by the composer Tomás Marco during an event in which the director of the Foundation will participate: Ruiz del Puerto and José Botella, President of the Foundation who will present the award to Cecilia Rodrigo, president of the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation.
During the event, which will be attended by numerous personalities from the cultural and musical world, the concert guitarist Alí Arango will perform works by Joaquín Rodrigo.
With this recognition, the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation joins a list of winners that will grow year after year and was inaugurated in 2022 by the internationally renowned guitarist Pepe Romero, winner of the first edition.
A wooden design closely linked to the guitar
The design of the statuette that will be delivered on March 15 reproduces the foundation's logo: an “A” for Alhambra, which means excellence, in red, in honor of the monumental palace built in Granada whose walls and buildings always shine and they evoke the reddish color of the material from which they are made.
The piece is made of wood, a material with which the Spanish guitar has traditionally been built. Likewise, its base is made up of six pieces of Cameroon ebony, in reference to the six strings of the guitar, which can also be seen in the six fine lines simulating strings that appear at the bottom of the entity's logo. The use of Cameroon wood is not coincidental, since the highest value guitars are built with this noble and exotic wood; In fact, the base does not have any type of treatment or varnish, since the way it is worked on the guitar, the ebony fingerboard is the only part of the guitar that has continuous contact with the air.
In short, a design closely related to the values that this Award represents: wood, originality, foundation and, above all, excellence and guitar.
Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation
Established by Cecilia, the only daughter of the Rodrigo couple and President of the Foundation that bears the name of her parents, the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation was born to respond to the need to create and preserve the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Archive, the object of visits and study by numerous Spanish and foreign researchers. An archive that includes a very extensive computerized documentary collection, made up of editorial, graphic, audiovisual, musical material and the correspondence, press and writings of Joaquín Rodrigo accumulated by the composer and his wife over nearly a hundred years. The Archive also includes the House Museum, preserved intact as it was during the lifetime of the composer and his wife.
Around such an impressive legacy, the Foundation develops extensive cultural work that includes mounting exhibitions and participating in activities dedicated to the figure and work of Joaquín Rodrigo, such as contests, conferences, round tables and publications, offering prizes in numerous international interpretation and research competitions around Joaquín Rodrigo.
Starting in 2006, the Victoria and Joaquín Rodrigo Foundation convenes the Joaquín Rodrigo International Interpretation Competition, in the modalities of guitar and singing, violin and piano in Madrid. Likewise, it collaborates with numerous Foundations in Spain, and promotes numerous publications.
Alhambra: A story of values, commitment and love for the guitar
Located in Muro de Alcoy (Alicante), Manufacturas Alhambra S.L. was founded in 1965 with the mission of creating stringed musical instruments. For almost 60 years experience, the company has always been at the side of young students and teachers, knowing their needs and supporting their initiatives. The continuous work for improvement and knowledge of the needs of the guitar world have meant that in recent years, competitions such as the Alhambra International Guitar Competition (CIGA) and the granting of international Alhambra scholarships have become consolidated as permanent activities.
The Alhambra Guitarras Foundation takes the baton and the work carried out so far by Manufacturas Alhambra and aims to promote, encourage and disseminate the world of the Spanish guitar in all its aspects internationally through different activities focused to students, performers and guitar composers with the aim of promoting, disseminating and enhancing guitar culture, collaborating in making a better and more supportive world through music and guitar.
Click on the following links:
- Periódico ABC
- www.ritmo.es: revista nº 981. Marzo 2024
- COESSM: Confederación Españolas Sociedades Musicales
- www.todalamusica.es
- www.radiobanda.com
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