Singer Lido Pimienta and Dallas Symphony Orchestra Music Director Fabio Luisi at the world premiere of “Arquitecta” by DSO conductor in residence Angélica Negrón.
“The Dallas Symphony Orchestra has been diversifying its programming and lineups of guest conductors,” writes Scott Cantrell in Friday’s (5/5) Dallas Morning News (login may be required). “On Thursday night, it presented the world premiere of a work suffused with Latin and even pop influences that would have been unimaginable on a classical series concert only a few seasons ago. It was quite an ear-opening prelude to Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto (with pianist Francesco Piemontesi) and the Brahms Fourth Symphony. Music director Fabio Luisi conducted. Ten minutes long, ‘Arquitecta’ is by Puerto Rican-born Angélica Negrón, who’s finishing a two-year stint as the DSO’s composer in residence. The earthy rhythms, heavily percussion-driven, are hardly revolutionary these days, nor are occasional lush swirls of orchestral colors. What was unusual Thursday night was a loudly amplified singer of hardly the usual ‘classical’ variety. Lido Pimienta, for whose distinctive vocalism the work was conceived, is billed on the DSO website as an ‘Afro / Indigenous / Colombian / Canadian / punk / folklorist / traditionalist / transgressive / diva / angel.’ Twisting and swaying in a pink dress, she belted out, and occasionally crooned, words to a Spanish poem by the Puerto Rican writer Amanda Hernández.”
