# Rodrigo García Ameneiro and the magic of making people dream through the piano

**Date:** 01/26/2021

Rodrigo García Ameneiro is one of those privileged young people of whom our music is proud. As if musical notes ran through his veins or all dreams were reduced to the DNA of a piano.

Accustomed to his virtuosity and creativity, followers of the young Cuban pianist have been able to learn these days—through social networks—about some images of the initiatives that steal sleep and hours from the talented artist, during the first month of 2021.

Rodrigo has announced that he is working on two projects in which he has concentrated energy and passion. "One is an album, which he has just finished recording, of contemporary Cuban music from the generation of Aldo López-Gavilán, Alejandro Falcón, Cucurucho Valdés, Harold López-Nussa and Rolando Luna," he explains. And it includes two pieces from each of these musicians, under the Colibrí record label.

"I'm very happy," he confesses, "we're almost ready to deliver it, the work is practically complete." But the idea has more ambitious creative horizons: "From there we're going to make a book with the sheet music of those pieces to deliver it to schools and hold concerts in them," with an educational purpose that gives greater significance to the initiative. Something that, from now on, is already envisioned as a "very beautiful" and enriching experience in the eyes of the young pianist.

The other good news hits the mark in a tribute concert conceived for television, which will be recorded Wednesday and Thursday of this week and will air on the small screen soon.

"It's a tribute I'm making to Cuban piano music. And I'm going to have as guests some very important pianists from here in Cuba, which is why I'm super grateful. The maestro Frank Fernández will be there, Aldito López-Gavilán, Miguelito Núñez, Harold López-Nussa, Roberto Fonseca, Alejandro Falcón, Tony Rodríguez, Robertico Carcassés, Cucurucho Valdés, Rolando Luna and Manolito Simonet," the young musician said.

"We're going to perform one piece from each of them. The concert will always have two pianos: I'll be at a host piano and all the guests will be taking turns at the other one. It's going to be something really beautiful; we did a set design at Cine Avenida, which is where it will be filmed, where we will have projected the work of the artist Sandor González, who painted several panels for the occasion arranged throughout the stage."

Among the guests, he also mentioned the Havana Chamber Orchestra, led by the renowned conductor Daiana García, co-producer along with Aldo López-Gavilán of the CD. The group Ceda el Paso, led by Rodrigo himself, will also be invited. It is "a huge production and we are eagerly waiting for it to turn out as well as we envisioned it."

Probably the years will prove short for Rodrigo compared to the successes and talent that overflow in his performances. At the threshold of his 23 years, he has accumulated laurels of great prestige: award for best composition at the Stanford Jazz Workshop 2016; first place in the international Vivo competition (2018) at Carnegie Hall in New York; special prize in the also international Grand Prize Virtuoso Amsterdam (2019) competition, alongside violinist Tania Haase, with whom he then formed the duo Espiral; second prize in the provincial Amadeo Roldán piano competition; as well as first prize in the Musicalia International Piano Competition (2019), an event in which he also won the award for the interpretation of Cuban music.

The special prize in Amsterdam allowed Rodrigo and Tania to record a CD for the KNS Classical record label, which should be released in the music world next March.

In December 2020, in the midst of the physical distancing imposed by COVID-19, Rodrigo took refuge in his art and made it, in turn, a virtual embrace to bring some of his good music to followers in Cuba and around the world.

And it seems that, in fulfilling his own, he has the gift of going around there—from that pleasant music that becomes, in him, horizon and nourishment—making the magic of making others dream through the piano come alive.