By Steven Brown
February 3, 2014
Choral conductor María Guinand has built her life's work on the belief that choirs can share much more than music.
Choral works, she says, offer windows into nations and cultures - as she aims to demonstrate Saturday, when she conducts the Houston Chamber Choir in a program of Latin American music. The concert will include musical styles, religious expressions, poetry and folklore from across the continent.
Guinand helps lead the choral counterpart of El Sistema, Venezuela's national music-education program. Thanks especially to the electrifying youth orchestra that has been El Sistema's ambassador, the programs have helped children whose futures first appeared bleak.And in Caracas, Venezuela, where she leads one of the country's leading ensembles - the Schola Cantorum - Guinand has spent nearly 40 years proving choirs can make an even deeper impact: They can change lives.
"The inspiration for El Sistema has been a great message to the world: Music can be a wonderful tool of inclusion," Guinand says. "It can give children dreams and possibilities."
More than music
Guinand says science was one of her best subjects in school, and her parents hoped she'd pick a career like engineering. But Guinand pursued music at England's Bristol University instead.
"I found in choral music a great family out in the world," Guinand says.
She graduated in 1976, an auspicious time to return home. El Sistema had been launched the year before, and its leaders thought a choir would help children learn music's basics. The Schola Cantorum agreed to set up a new ensemble and hired Guinand to help.
Venezuelan conductor Maria Guinand will lead the Houston Chamber Choir in concert Feb. 8.
Courtesy Photo
Venezuelan conductor Maria Guinand led the Houston Chamber Choir in concert Feb. 8.
As more youth choirs were created, Guinand watched their young members learn other skills.
"You need to concentrate. You need to be disciplined," Guinand says. "You need to understand that music is an art and creating beauty needs effort. To work in groups gives you the idea that you belong to a team, and if you are not there, the team loses. You feel important and included."
Today, the choirs work with educational and social organizations that help disadvantaged children. When the choirs stage events, the children get food and transportation, and their parents can attend for free.
A former choir member recently sent Guinand a thank-you note, saying the skills she cultivated in choirs enabled her to escape the slums and become a nurse.
"We cannot solve all the problems of life with choral music," Guinand says. "But we can put a light in the hearts of the children, and in the hearts of the families, so they know they can search for other things in life. They can be better and find solutions to their problems."
Guinand's parents finally decided their daughter had followed the right path.
"They could see that if you do your career with passion and energy, you can be fulfilled with what you're doing," she says.
Exploring worlds
Guinand is now the Schola Cantorum's artistic director, and she travels worldwide as a guest conductor. She's a natural choice for a U.S. group that wants to bring Latin American music to its audience, says Robert Simpson, Houston Chamber Choir's artistic director. He expects her to bring out colors and nuances that he and the choir couldn't imagine on their own.
"It's very important to me that when we go into a specialized field, we go into it with someone who makes it the center of their artistic life," Simpson says. "It's a way to experience another culture in a very authentic way."
Guinand has put together a diverse program. Latin America's Spanish heritage represents only one of its roots, she says; others include African immigrants and indigenous groups.
"I want people to understand that Latin American is not a bunch of countries that … are all the same," Guinand says. "There is a huge variety of feelings, rhythms, songs, images."
Simpson says the 14 works Guinand has picked range from an Argentine composer's setting of Psalm 114 that could've been written by a European, to a jovial Cuban dance featuring a series of tall tales, to a Venezuelan song paying tribute to the country's high plains.
A Brazilian piece is rooted in African religion. It represents a condomble, a ritual invoking a deity.
"The music is intoxicating - throbbing," Simpson says. "You know that you're not in Kansas any more when you hear this."
Houston Chamber Choir
When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday
Where: South Main Baptist Church, 4011 Main