Alberto Villalpando

Alberto Villalpando (born 21 November 1940) is a Bolivian composer.

Biography Villalpando was born in La Paz. He began his musical training in Potosí under Santiago Velásquez and Padre José Díaz Gainza. From 1958 he studied at the Conservatory of Buenos Aires with Alberto Ginastera, Pedro Sáenz, Abraham Jurafsky and Roberto García Morillo, and in 1963–1964 at the Latin American Center for Higher Musical Studies (CLAEM) in Buenos Aires with Olivier Messiaen, Riccardo Malipiero, Luigi Dallapiccola, Alberto Ginastera, Bruno Maderna and Aaron Copland. There, in collaboration with Miguel Angel Rondano, he developed a sound installation for an exhibition of the painter Carlos Squirru.

In 1964 he became head of the State Film Institute of Bolivia, and in 1967 was appointed director of the Music Department of the Bolivian Ministry of Culture. In addition, he served as professor of composition and director of the National Conservatory of La Paz and the music seminar of the Universidad Católica Boliviana and was Bolivian cultural attaché to France. In 1998 he received Bolivia's National Culture Award.

In addition to orchestral works such as Phantastischen Liturgie, Strukturen (for piano and orchestra), and Von der Liebe, der Furcht und dem Schweigen (for piano and chamber orchestra), he composed ballet and film music, works for chamber orchestra, and Sonnengesang for soloists, choir and orchestra. While studying electroacoustic music, he benefited from the tape recorder, producing Bolivianos...! in Leo Küpper's recording studio. Later he drew on electroacoustic sound and the technical developments offered by MIDI.

Works Five Preludes for solo piano, 1960 La Muerte for tape, 1964 Mística No. 3 for two string quartets, horn, flute, double bass and tape, 1970 Mística No. 4 for string quartet, piano and tape, 1970 Bolivianos...! for tape, 1973 Yamar y Armor, ballet music for voice, tape and orchestra, after Blanca Wiethüchter, 1975 Desde el Jardín de Morador for MIDI, 1990 Transformaciones del agua y del fuego en las montanas for orchestra 1991 De los Elementos for MIDI, 1991 Manchaypuytu, opera, 1995 Qantatai for choir, narrator and electronic sounds, 1996 La Lagarta, ballet for narrator and elektroakustische sounds, after Blanca Wiethüchter, 2002 Piano 3 for piano and two piano synthesizers, 2002 Mística 10 for viola profonda and piano, 2009 Los diálogos de Tunupa for viola profonda and string orchestra, 2011