Rafaela Serrano Rodríguez

Rafaela Serrano Rodríguez (born February 6, 1862 in Fernán Núñez , † April 1, 1938 in Havana ) was a Cuban pianist and music teacher of Spanish origin.

Serrano studied from 1876 at the Escuela Nacional de Música in Madrid piano with Dámaso Zabalza and harmony with Miguel Gliena Folques . After she had won first prizes in both subjects (1879 and 1880), she was accepted into the instrumental ensemble class of Valentín de Zubiaurre . In January 1880 she accompanied Pablo de Sarasate to perform at the Sociedad de Escritores in Madrid.

In 1886 she went to Havana to complete her training with Nicolás Ruiz Espadero , the son of the pianist Dolores Esperado . She performed there in the Casino Español and the Círculo Habanero and became professor and piano and harmony teacher at the Conservatorio Nacional de Música . In 1886 she was one of the founding members of Modesto Julián's Solidaridad Musical , was a member of the Liga Musical Cubana and was a member of the Orquesta Sinfónica de La Habana , the most important symphony orchestra in Cuba from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

From 1915 until her retirement she was part of the faculty of the of Hubert de Blanck founded Escuela Nacional de Música Hubert de Blanck . She wrote a Teoría razonada de la música , which appeared in the second edition in collaboration with Molina Torres y Menocal , as well as didactic texts and published a two-volume collection of school songs that was used in kindergartens and public schools. Your compositions for piano have been lost.

At a tribute organized by students and colleagues at the Teatro Nacional on the occasion of her retirement , the musicologist and composer Eduardo Sánchez Fuentes gave a speech that appeared in the Folclorismo Collection . Serrano's most famous student was César Pérez Sentenat .

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• EcuRed: Rafaela Serrano Rodríguez
• El Día de Córdoba, September 17, 2017: La pianista que se enamoró de La Habana