Uruguay's Gustavo Daniel Cardinal (Photo D.Mangurian-IDB)

IDB¥s Cultural Center

By Paul Constance

The 27-year-old Uruguayan pianist was keenly aware that in the crowded and ultra-competitive world of classical music, a United States debut in the nation's capital could help jump-start an international career.

But in fact, things did get better. Minutes before he took the stage in the IDB's AndrÈs Bello Auditorium on July 31, 1997, to play pieces by Bach, Liszt and Pons, Cardinal learned that the audience included a music critic from The Washington Post, the city's most influential paper.

"That motivated me even more," jokes Cardinal. Two days later, in an article headlined "Cardinal's Soaring Debut," the critic praised the pianist's "note perfect performance," "deft lyricism" and "seemingly innate ability to open up classical music."

"The concert and that review were a tremendous reaffirmation for me," said Cardinal, who is now continuing his music studies at the University of Indiana under an all- expenses-paid Fulbright Scholarship.

Cardinal is one of several dozen young classical musicians from Latin America and the Caribbean who have performed at Bank headquarters as part of the IDB Cultural Center's Concert Series. Since 1992, the series has organized a total of 60 concerts featuring soloists, small ensembles and chamber orchestras. Although most of the concerts feature artists whose careers are just beginning, the series also has attracted stars like Chilean soprano VerÛnica Villaroel and Jamaican jazz pianist Monty Alexander.

"We feel it is important to introduce these talented young artists to an American audience," says Cultural Center Director Ana MarÌa Coronel de RodrÌguez, who launched the program as a complement to the center's lecture series and ongoing visual arts exhibitions. "The concerts give them an opportunity to show what they're capable of."

They also help to correct a misperception. "American audiences often don't realize that there is a lot of classical music going on in Latin America and that we take it very seriously," says Antonio RincÛn, a young Dominican violinist who performed at the IDB last October and who now plays in chamber and symphony orchestras in the U.S., Puerto Rico, and his homeland.

Anne Vena, who runs the concert series, says they also help raise awareness of the region's composers, because almost all the performers make it a point to include works by composers from their home country.

The program offered at a concert last February by Quinteto D'Elas, an ensemble from Brazil known for playing works by women and Latin American composers, was a case in point. Along with pieces by Johann Hummel and Louise Farrenc, they played Ney Vasconcellos' Suite Veridiana, Tom Jobim's Samba de uma nota sÛ and Paquito D'Rivera's Wapango.

"This is not the kind of music your typical Washington concert-goer gets to hear!" says Vena.