Alfonso Montes

Alfonso Montes (born September 2, 1955 in Ciudad Bolívar ) is a Venezuelan composer and guitarist.

As a child, Montes had guitar lessons from Carlos Atilano and Leopoldo Igarza in Caracas . With a scholarship from the Venezuelan Ministry of Culture, he went to London in 1976 , where he was a student of John Duarte until 1982 and studied music theory and composition at the Royal College of Music and at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama with Adrian Thorne .

Then he taught a. a. at the University College of Music in London (1980–1982), at the Instituto Universtario de Estudios Musicales in Caracas and at the Cannington International Summer School (1980–1991), coordinated the youth orchestra work in Caracas from 1985 to 1987 and was director of the 1991 and 1992 International Guitar Festival in Cambridge (1991–1992).

In 1992 he was appointed cultural attaché of the Venezuelan embassy, ​​first in London, then until 1997 in Bonn. From 1998 to 2000 he was Director General for International Affairs of the National Council for Culture.

He had to emigrate at the end of 2000 because of his criticism of President Chavez's regime . He lives in Stuttgart with his wife Irina Kircher , with whom he has been working as Duo Montes-Kircher since 1984 . The duo performed at numerous European festivals, gave more than 1,000 concerts and recorded eighteen records.

In addition to solo and concert works for the guitar, Montes also composed film and drama music as well as symphonic works.

Web links

• Duo Montes-Kircher
• Works by and about Alfonso Montes in the catalog of the German National Library