Latin American Electroacoustic Music Collection

Arturo Rodas (Ecuador)


Arturo Rodas (born in Quito, 1954) studied music and law in his native country before to go to Europe to complete his studies in composition and electroacoustic music in France during the early 80's. There he studied electronic music at Centre Europeen de Recherche Musicale in Metz, as well as concrete music composition at the Conservatoire National de Paris.

Back in Quito, Arturo Rodas was editor of the monthly musical magazine "Opus" from 1986 to 1989. He wrote several articles and essays for this magazine published by the "Musicoteca del Banco Central of Ecuador" and also a book about contemporary music, "Nuestros Dias", published by the Ecuadorian Centro de Investigacion y Cultura. Since 1990 Rodas is living in Europe again, working as a free lance composer and teacher based in London.

Rodas composed "Voudriez-vous fermer les yeux un instant s'il vous plaƮt?" for tape in 1983; "Obsesiva" for orchestra and computer generated sounds in 1988, commissioned by IBM Ecuador; and three tape pieces in 2001: "El llanto del disco duro", "Bailecito" and "Fermez les yeux s.v.p." (according to Rodas this new piece replaces the 1983 one).

About "Bestiary", a new work by Rodas' (2002), he explains:
"It consists in a set of electroacoustic pieces which can be seen as commentaries on the acoustic soli from another set. The later, called "Fauna", being a collection of solo pieces for most of the instruments of the orchestra. Both sets form a cycle called "The book of the orchestra". The electroacoustic pieces articulate the acoustic pieces. In other words, "Bestiary" articulates "Fauna" and the two sets become "The book of the Orchestra".
The form is akin to Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an exhibition" in which the pictures are articulated by the promenades. The difference is that, in my work, the "pictures" are played by various instruments and the "promenades" are electronic thoughts on the "pictures". As it is the case with Mussorgsky's work, most of the pieces (pictures) can also be played separately.
The soli in "Fauna" are: one piece for piccolo; one piece for flute in C; one piece for flute in G; three pieces for B flat clarinet; two pieces for oboe; one piece for english horn; one piece for B flat bass clarinet; one piece for bassoon; one piece for Contrabassoon; one piece for trumpet piccolo in D; one piece for B flat trumpet; one piece for tenor trombone; one piece for tuba; one piece for violin; and one piece for viola (still to be done or in process: pieces for violoncello, vibraphone and timpani).
Eight of the pieces or "comments" of "Bestiario" are finished at this stage:
1. comments on tuning, trumpets, "unreal" percussion;
2. comments on flutes, tunning;
3. comments about the viola, and the trumpet soli;
4. comments about the contra bassoon and the oboe soli;
5. comments about trumpet trio, viola, timpani, other "concrete" formants;
6. mainly comments about the soli for english horn and violoncello;
7. comments about bassoon, english horn (again), harp, trumpets, etc;
8. and comments about cello, timpani, trumpet."

(text updated: March, 2003)

Resources available for this composer:
- List of compositions (14 compositions)

Index: