About
Juan Ferrer: One of the most versatile and active Spanish clarinetists of his generation, and the first Spaniard to serve on the jury of the prestigious Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, Gandawie in Belgium, Versailles (France), and the Asia-Oceania Competition in Taipei (Taiwan), as well as the Carlino (Italy) competition, where he also gave recitals and masterclasses. Ferrer is a member of the Galician Symphony Orchestra, where he has played the first clarinet since 1994. His excellent playing has led him to concerts in China, Taiwan, Switzerland, France, Italy, Belgium, Portugal, Brazil, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Paraguay, Argentina, and throughout Spain. He has performed under the direction of some of the most prestigious conductors, including Gustavo Dudamel, Lorin Maazel, Daniel Harding, Sir Neville Marriner, Osmo Vänskä, Gennadi Rozdestvensky, Peter Maag, James Conlon, Jesús López Cobos, Stanisław Scrowaczewski, Dima Slobodeniouk, Gian Andrea Noseda, Christoph Eschenbach, Juanjo Mena, and Alberto Zedda, among many others. Juan Ferrer is a professor at the University of Alfonso X el Sabio in Madrid, where he teaches performance. He also regularly gives courses in Spain, France, China, Taiwan, Italy, Portugal, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Paraguay, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Belgium, Russia, and Argentina. He has participated in six editions of the Ibero-American Clarinet Academy in Castelo de Paiva (Portugal). He has recently recorded an album with pianist Daniel Del Pino, and the works have been dedicated to him by world-renowned composers: Salvador Brotons, Fernando Buide, Eduardo Soutullo, Karol Lis, Octavio Vázquez, Wladimir Rosinskij, and Juan Durán. Christian Vásquez: The Venezuelan conductor has been the principal conductor of the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra since 2013. He began his collaboration with this Norwegian orchestra by performing Gustav Mahler's Second Symphony. Christian Vásquez is also the music director of the La Sinfónica Juvenil Teresa Carreño de Venezuela youth orchestra. He was the first guest conductor of the Swedish Gävle Symphony Orchestra from 2010 to 2013, a position he obtained after his debut with the orchestra in 2009, during his first visit to Europe. He has worked with many world-renowned orchestras, from Ottawa to Tokyo. He has conducted in venues such as the Grosses Festspielhaus in Salzburg, the Konzerthaus in Vienna, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, and the Berlin Philharmonie. Christian Vásquez was born in 1984 in Caracas. He began his musical journey by learning to play the violin. At the age of nine, he became a member of the children's and youth orchestra in San Sebastián de los Reyes, and later La Sinfónica de la Juventud Venezolana Simón Bolívar. He began his conducting studies with José Antonio Abreu in 2006, and soon became the music director of Sinfónica Juvenil de Aragua José Félix Ribas.
