By Alkis Karmpaliotis
Founder of AppreciateOpera.org
On Thursday, July 18, acclaimed tenor Juan Diego Flórez announced the establishment of his own record label, Florez Records. The first album, dedicated to the Zarzuela genre, will be released in the fall of 2024.
The album will be Flórez's first recording with the Sinfonia por el Perú Youth Orchestra, part of the non-profit Sinfonia por el Perú, which he founded to promote music education in his home country. A European tour will follow the album's release, with stops at Madrid, Paris, and Vienna, among other major arts centers.
Zarzuela, a genre of Spanish musical theater spanning from the 17th to 20th centuries, is incredibly diverse, containing everything from dramatic operatic arias to romantic folk songs. Yet, it remains very underperformed and underappreciated, even within the opera community. "These romances full of passion and emotion represent an almost unique opportunity for Spanish and Latin American tenors to sing in their mother tongue," remarked Flórez.
If you are interested in learning more about Zarzuela, as well as getting a taste of what it sounds like, check out my review of soprano Judith Rodriguez's album of Zarzuela arias.
My name is Alkis Karmpaliotis, and I'm a senior at the Ethical Culture Fieldston School in New York. I founded AppreciateOpera.org in 2019, and you can support my work by becoming a member and reading some of my other articles!
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