Arturo Márquez (b. 1950)
Arturo Marquez wrote the following notes for the premiere of Danzón No. 2:
The idea of writing the Danzón 2 originated in 1993 during a trip to Malinalco with the painter Andrés Fonseca and the dancer Irene Martínez, both of whom [have] a special passion for the danzón, which they were able to transmit to me from the beginning, and also during later trips to Veracruz and visits to the Colonia Salon in Mexico City. From these experiences onward, I started to learn the danzón’s rhythms, its form, its melodic outline, and to listen to the old recordings by Acerina Mariano Merceron and his Danzonera Orchestra. I was fascinated and I started to understand that the apparent lightness of the danzón is only like a visiting card for a type of music full of sensuality and qualitative seriousness, a genre which old Mexican people continue to dance with a touch of nostalgia and a jubilant escape towards their own emotional world; we can fortunately still see this in the embrace between music and dance that occurs in the State of Veracruz and in the dance parlors of Mexico City.
Danzón 2 … endeavors to get as close as possible to the dance, to its nostalgic melodies, to its wild rhythms, and although it violates its intimacy, its form and its harmonic language, it is a very personal way of paying my respects and expressing my emotions towards truly popular music.
The music opens with a sultry clarinet melody, soon joined by gently swaying rhythms that evoke the dance floor’s poised anticipation. Gradually, the tempo quickens, and the piece bursts into vivid color—strings shimmer, brass blaze, and percussion drives the pulse forward with irresistible momentum. The rhythm alternates between restraint and abandon, mirroring the dancers’ flirtatious interplay. Energetic, sensual, and irresistibly rhythmic, Danzón No. 2 has become a favored finale, its vibrant pulse providing a compelling and memorable close to many orchestral programs.
About Arturo Márquez
Arturo Márquez, born in 1950 in Álamos, Sonora, is one of Mexico’s most widely recognized contemporary composers. His early musical education began after his family relocated to La Puente, California, where he started formal studies in the mid-1960s. He later returned to Mexico to pursue training in piano and theory at the Conservatory of Music, eventually continuing his compositional studies at the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes under Joaquín Gutiérrez Heras, Héctor Quintanar, and Federico Ibarra. Márquez broadened his artistic perspective through additional work in Paris with Jacques Castérède and later at the California Institute of the Arts, where he studied with Morton Subotnick, Stephen Mosko, Mel Powell, and James Newton.
Márquez’s music—particularly his celebrated series of Danzones—has earned him a distinguished place in Latin American concert music. His catalog includes numerous commissions from prominent cultural and musical institutions, among them the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Organization of American States, the San Antonio Symphony, UNAM, the Universidad Metropolitana, Festival Cervantino, and others. Throughout his career he has received support from organizations such as Mexico’s Institute of Fine Arts, the French Ministry of Culture, the Fulbright Foundation, and Mexico’s national arts council, which awarded him a major composition fellowship in 1994.
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