Melofonia at Clarinet Festival.

Melofonía is an exhibition that the Plastic Arts Department of the Escuela Profesional de Arte de Matanzas dedicated to the I Clarinet Festival, held in the city from July 13th to 15th, sponsored by several Matanzas institutions and with the collaboration of artists, family members and teachers.

The project is part of exercises of students of various levels, who exhibited in the gallery of the White Hall, in the inaugural activity, whose words were in the voice of the master clarinetist Roberto Medina, who had the idea of creating the event along with teachers and instrumentalists Yoannia Calama, Jose Ernesto Rodriguez and Yoleidys Valderrama.

The clarinet is the protagonist of the exhibition, but it encompasses other areas of music such as jazz and other instruments, like the trumpet.I think it was a beautiful initiative this link with the visual arts and the youngest artists.

It is not the first time that this fact of disciplinary collaboration occurs. I remember the tributes to Dámaso Pérez Prado, made, first, by the designer and painter Israel Rodríguez, who conceived designs for the installation, which he later exhibited in several galleries in Cuba and Mexico. And by Adrian Socorro, during the centennial of El Rey del Mambo in 2017, who bequeathed singular works that combined several techniques to pay tribute to the brilliant musician born in Matanzas on December 11th, 1917.

The White Hall itself is an example of combination from the murals and the constant exhibitions of maestro Sergio Roque Ruano, which reflect the fusion of the arts in which music is the protagonist in a province that stands out for its countless contributions to its history.

Poster design dedicated to events or anniversaries related to music has had several representative exponents in Matanzas for more than five decades and I am thinking of the contributions of Juan Antonio Carbonell, Rolando Estévez, Zenén Calero, Johan E. Trujillo, among others, who deserve a separate study.

Melofonía has the singular youthful spirit that merges with one of the characteristics of the I Clarinet Festival. Ciudad de los Puentes, the bet on the talent of future generations of artists from Matanzas, fused with masters.

There is a mixture of techniques and styles, there is freshness and talent in each of the works exhibited, ranging from abstract to some more attached to realism. Works that synthesize the essential idea of situating the clarinet in its searches and results.

Some of the works could have been the ones that represented the event of the Matanzas clarinetists that counted during three days with master classes, workshops, concerts, with the protagonism of masters like Vicente Monterrey, Sabrina del Riego, Roberto Medina, Yoleidys Valderrama, Yoania Calama and Jose Ernesto Rodriguez, that culminated with an ensemble, that proved the significance of the clarinet in Matanzas.

Melofonía dialogued with what took place in the memorable space, which filled the White Hall with a mostly young audience.

To the exhibition we must add the effectiveness of the curatorship and installation, which contributed to create other meanings and beauty to the whole, framed in the architecture of the concert hall.

This text serves as an invitation to visit it.

written by Edel Rodríguez Febles.