Allegro Guitar Series Presents Spanish Master Guitarist Pepe Romero In Intimate Venues

Fort Worth: February 12, 7:30PM, Pepe Romero at Kimbell Museum, Renzo Piano Pavilion Auditorium

Dallas: February 13, 8:00PM, Pepe Romero at University Park United Methodist Church

Fort Worth: February 14, 7:30PM, Guitar Society Annual GALA: Pepe Romero at Kimbell Museum, Renzo Piano Pavilion Auditorium – Concert, Spanish Tapas and Wine, Meet and Greet with Pepe!

Ticket information is at GuitarSociety.org or call 817-498-0363.

Ticket prices are $45, $75, and $125

There are very few true living legends in the world of classical music, and fewer still have sustained greatness and grown throughout their lives. Pepe Romero is such an artist.

It is a special treat to hear a great master at the height of his or her career, but most often it is in a venue of 2000 or more seats. The Allegro Guitar Series will present the reigning virtuoso of Spanish Classical and Flamenco guitar, Pepe Romero, in venues much smaller and more intimate than you would usually hear him. Pepe’s warmth and charm will be up-close and personal.

Pepe Romero will perform concerts in Fort Worth, Thursday, February 12, at 7:30PM at the Kimbell Museum, Renzo Piano Pavilion Auditorium and in Dallas on Friday, February 13, at 8:00PM at University Park United Methodist Church.

On Valentine’s Day, Saturday, February 14, at 7:30PM, Pepe and his wife Carissa will be our special guests at the Guitar Society Annual GALA. Pepe will perform a one hour concert of his favorite classical and Flamenco music in the auditorium followed by a “Meet and Greet,” Spanish Tapas, and Wine in the beautiful Renzo Piano Pavilion.

As a soloist, guest artist with top tier orchestras, chamber musician, and with The Romeros Quartet, virtuoso Pepe Romero has made more than 60 classical and flamenco recordings since he was a teen and continues to delight audiences all over the world.

In February of 2000, His Royal Majesty King Juan Carlos I of Spain, knighted Pepe, his brothers and his father into the Order of “Isabel la Catolica,” Spain’s highest honor. Pepe has also been received numerous honorary doctorates as well as a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award as a member of The Romeros Quartet

He and his family were the subject of a PBS-TV documentary, The Royal Family of the Guitar, and he was prominently featured in the documentary, Shadows & Light: Composer Joaquin Rodrigo at 90.

Romero also devotes much time to giving master classes around the world, believing strongly in helping young guitarists.

Please visit http://www.GuitarSociety.org/EPK for our electronic press kit.

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For more information please contact Christopher McGuire at 817-229-3617 (cell) or by email Chris@GuitarSociety.org – Website: GuitarSociety.org

Pepe Romero Bio:

There are very few true living legends in the world of classical music, few who have sustained greatness and grown throughout their lives. Pepe Romero is such an artist. He has been honored by kings, heads of state, and major institutions-the encomiums continue to pour in. But to Romero, his most important contribution has been reaching the common man. He has communicated the richness and beauty of the classical guitar to millions of people throughout the world. He has, indeed, become an ambassador of classical music, and, correspondingly, of the classical guitar.

But this gift did not just appear out of nowhere. Pepe is the second son of one of the greatest guitarists that ever lived-Celedonio Romero. And he is brother to two more musical phenoms-Celin and Angel Romero. But perhaps we should start at the beginning… Pepe was born in Málaga, Spain, in 1944. In those days, following the devastating Spanish Civil War (1936-39) and during the Second World War, Spain was in desperate economic straits. Basic survival was the primary challenge. Yet, in spite of this, Celedonio Romero and his remarkable wife, Angelita, instilled in all three of their children a love of music that transcended the profound misery surrounding them.

By age seven, Pepe set foot on the concert stage for the first time, at the Teatro Lope de Vega in Sevilla. And now, more than fifty years later, he continues to mesmerize audiences throughout the world. During that time, he has given literally thousands of concerts worldwide, many with the remarkable Romero Quartet, and many as a solo instrumentalist. He has worked with almost every major conductor alive, and has to his credit more than 60 recordings (among which are 20 concerto recordings with the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, with both Neville Marriner and Iona Brown).

Pepe Romero has premiered works by some of the finest composers of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Joaquín Rodrigo, Federico Moreno Torroba, Lorenzo Palomo, Padre Francisco de Madina, Paul Chihara, Enrique Diemecke, Ernesto Cordero, and, most poignantly, Celedonio Romero, have written compositions for Pepe. Always a champion of music by composers in earlier periods of music history, he has also delved into rare archives to re-explore lost pieces by Fernando Sor, Mauro Giuliani, Francesco Molino, Ferdinando Carulli, Johann Kaspar Mertz, Luigi Boccherini, and others.

In 1992, Pepe Romero performed on a groundbreaking laser disc of the Concierto de Aranjuez with Neville Marriner and the Academy of St-Martin-in-the-Fields. He played a prominent role in the major film documentary Shadows and Light: Joaquin Rodrigo at 90, which received numerous plaudits worldwide (including the Chicago International Film Festival, International Emmy Awards, and San Francisco International Film Festival).

Maestro Romero’s many accomplishments include: world premieres of Rodrigo´s Concierto andaluz (with the entire Romero Guitar Quartet), Concierto madrigal (with Angel Romero), and Concierto para una fiesta; Federico Moreno Torroba’s Diálogos entre guitarra y orquesta (Pepe was personally chosen by Moreno Torroba and Andrés Segovia for the world premiere recording of this work dedicated to Segovia); and Lorenzo Palomo’s Concierto de Cienfuegos (with the Romero Quartet) and Nocturnos de Andalucía (both released on the Naxos label). He also revived the great orchestral work Metamorfosi de concert by Xavier Montsalvatge, with Gianandrea Noseda, and premiered as well as recorded the Concerto for Guitar and Orchestra with Trumpet Obbligato by Paul Chihara, with Neville Marriner and the London Symphony.

In 2005 the Romero Quartet recorded Concierto vasco para 4 guitarras y orquesta by Francisco de Madina (written for the Romeros) with the Basque National Orchestra on a Claves release (entitled Aita Madina). A prominent new recording entitled The Romeros: Generations, features premieres of works by Jorge Morel (such as El Maestro, dedicated to Celedonio) and by Pepe himself, Recuerdos del pasado. In the spring of 2005, a solo recital release called Corazón Español became available on the CPA Hollywood Records label. Shortly thereafter, on the same label, came Classic Romero, another invaluable recital recording. In the summer of 2008, Pepe Romero recorded a splendid solo-vocal work by Lorenzo Palomo, with internationally recognized Spanish soprano Maria Bayo. It included the song cycles Mi jardín solitario (with texts by Celedonio Romero) and Madrigal and Five Sephardic Songs and was released on the NAXOS label in 2009 along with Palomo’s Concierto de Cienfuegos with the Romero Quartet and Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos conducting the Sevilla Royal Symphony Orchestra. Celebrating their 50th anniversary and released in 2009, is a brand new recording by the Romeros for Sony´s RCA Red Seal Label entitled Los Romeros: Celebration. In November 2011 Deutsche Grammophon released Christmas with the Romeros featuring the Romeros and Christmas favorites. A new Spanish solo guitar collection featuring Pepe Romero includes a premiere recording of Suite Madrileña No. 1 by Celedonio Romero and is due for release in summer 2012 by Deutsche Grammophon.

In the 2012/2013 season Pepe Romero will be honoring the 100th anniversary of the birth of his father, the legendary Celedonio Romero. And in 2013/2104, Pepe Romero will tour the world celebrating his own 70th year.

Pepe Romero has performed (by himself and with his family) at the White House, the Vatican for Pope John Paul II, for HRH Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia of Spain, and Queen Beatrice of Holland. He has been a special guest at music festivals in Salzburg, Israel, Schleswig-Holstein, Tanglewood, Menuhin Festival, Osaka, Granada, Istanbul, Ravinia, Garden State, Hollywood Bowl, Blossom, Wolf Trap, and Saratoga, among many others.

In the United States, he has appeared with leading symphony orchestras in Philadelphia, Cleveland, Chicago, Houston, Detroit, Pittsburgh, Boston, San Francisco, Dallas, New York, and Los Angeles, as well as with the Orpheus Chamber Ensemble and Boston Pops. European ensembles with which he has appeared include the Academy of St-Martins-in-the-Fields, Dresden Philharmonic, London Symphony, Monte Carlo Philharmonic, I Musici, Zurich Chamber Orchestra, Philharmonia Hungarica, Solisti di Zagreb, Hungarian State Orchestra, Spanish National Orchestra, Spanish National Radio Television Orchestra, Norddeutscher Rundfunk, Hamburg Philharmoniker, L’Orchestre de la Suisse-Romande, Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, New Moscow Chamber Orchestra, American Sinfonietta, and Bournemouth Symphony-among many others.

In addition, he has collaborated with such distinguished conductors as Sir Neville Marriner, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Jesús López-Cobos, Eugene Ormandy, Antoni Ros-Marbà, Josep Pons, Arthur Fiedler, Lawrence Foster, Enrique Jordá, Andre Kostelanetz, Leonard Slatkin, Phillipe Entremont, Odón Alonso, Morton Gould, Michael Palmer, Guillermo Figueroa, Michael Zearrot, Miguel Ángel Gómez Martínez, Pedro Halffter, and Christoph Eschenbach.

Pepe Romero has always felt, along with his father and brothers, that the sharing of one’s art is a personal responsibility. Mr. Romero has served as Professor of Guitar at the University of Southern California, University of California at San Diego, Southern Methodist University, and the University of San Diego. He has conducted master classes at the Salzburg Summer Academy, Córdoba Guitar Festival, and the Schleswig-Holstein Festival. In 2004 he was appointed Distinguished Artist in Residence at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music.

Pepe Romero holds an honorary doctorate in music from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the University of Victoria, British Columbia. In June 1996, he received the “Premio Andalucía de la Música,” the highest recognition given by his native land for his contribution to the arts. In addition, His Majesty, King Juan Carlos I of Spain, has knighted Pepe and his brothers into the Order of “Isabel la Católica.”

A biographical documentary about the Romeros appeared on PBS in 2001 entitled “Los Romeros, the Royal Family of the Guitar.” Following this production, German television released another brilliant documentary about the Romeros entitled ¨Los Romeros, the Dynasty of the Guitar.” In 2007, the Romeros received the President’s Merit Award from the Recording Academy, producers of the Grammy Awards, for their significant contributions to the music world and professional career achievements.

What will come tomorrow? Who knows? Pepe is only just beginning to flex his artistic muscles…

Contact: Christopher McGuire
Cell: 817-229-3617
Email: Chris@GuitarSociety.org
Office: 817-498-0363