News:

! Under the direction of Lorena Guillén, the Triangle Jewish Chorale is launching an exciting project for the spring of 2013. The Chorale has commissioned a cantata that explores the Jewish immigrant experience in North Carolina and celebrates the enduring communities around the state. The libretto is to be based on the acclaimed documentary film, exhibit, and book Down Home: Jewish Life in North Carolina, written by historian Leonard Rogoff. The music has been commisioned to Alejandro Rutty, composer and music professor at UNCG. The piece will feature soloists, choir, and instrumental ensemble. The TJC plans to present the cantata’s premier performance on April 28, 2013 at Goodson Chapel, Duke University, followed by performances in Raleigh and Greensboro. For more info, check: www.trianglejewishchorale.org

!February 8, 2013, 8 pm: Lorena Guillen Tango Duo presentation at Musical Soirees Among Friends, a new concert series in Durham (NC), located at the Meeting House of the Durham Friends, 404 Alexander Ave.

!February 9, 2013, 7 pm:  Lorena Guillen Tango Duo presentation in "Night of Art and Tango" in Casa Azul (205 Lyndon St., Greensboro), along the art exhibition and live demonstration of Fernanda Piamonti.

!April 7, 2013, 7:30 pm: Lorena Guillen Tango Duo along with the string quartet of Jacqui Carrasco, Fabian Lopez, Scott Rawls and Alexander Ezerman in concert and post-concert talk at Wake Forest University.

Listen:

"Aria" from Bachiana Brasileira n.5-H.Villa-Lobos (Arranged for voice and saxophone quartet)
With Ball Statet University "Mosaic" Saxophone Quartet

"The Oven Bird" from Instrument of the Tongue-Allen Anderson
With Inara Zandmane, piano.

Madrigals Book II -George Crumb
With Gretchen Rowe, alto flute, and Thomas McClusky, percussion.
I. Bebe el agua tranquila
II. La muerte entra y sale de la taverna
III. Caballito negro dónde llevas tu jinete muerto

Circles-Luciano Berio
With Mario Falcao, harp, Tiffany Nicely and Thomas McClusky, percussion

Sequenza III-L. Berio (solo voice)

Two Indigenas Songs- Jorge Luis Acevedo Vargas
With Nora Ponte , piano
I. Canción de cuna bribrí
II. Canción de cuna cocorí

Confeso - Ricardo Risco Cortés
With Nora Ponte, piano

Mirrors- Nora Ponte
With Nora Ponte, piano

Acorn in the Sun- Mark Engebretson
With Mark Engebretson, computer/electronics

Special Concert Programs:

I. For information about Lorena Guillén's tango shows please visit:
www.nevertootango.blogspot.com

Reviews:

Described as..."a delicate soprano"
(The Washington Post, DC)
"(she) produces a notably Latin sound, rich and full of expression,
a sound quite different from what an American soprano produces"
(The Classical Voice of North Carolina)

Praised for her..."polished performance of...French cabaret song...(and)...total mastery
of the difficult Sprechtstimme"
(The Washington Post, DC)

About her "tango" presentations...
"sung with the kind of conviction for which Guillén has become
known in this material"
(Buffalo News, NY)

"...a diminutive figure but a major presence on stage, with each word
and syllable delivered with consummate grace and rhythm, inflected
to the maximum without a hint of overdone sentiment or kitsch, as dry
as the driest martini, bringing out all the wit and feeling of the lyrics."
(The Classical Voice of North Carolina)

About her new music concerts...
"...offered (her) talent and soul on stage...showed off (her) marvelous
vocal and interpretative gifts..."
(Diario de Cuyo, Agentina)

About her staged performances..."...a strong, sweet voice that sounded in good shape. Guillén specially,
has enormous poise and presence, and is a fine actress"
(Albuquerque Journal, NM)

Biography

Lorena Guillén was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, initiating her voice training at the National Conservatory of Music. She holds a Master in Vocal Performance and a Ph.D. in Musicology from SUNY at Buffalo.

Equally at home as a perfomer of “art” music and her homeland popular “tango” song, Guillén has premiered and recorded many compositions by living composers and the “classics” of the 20th and 21st centuries as well the standards of the “tango” song. She has presented concerts at such venues as: Mary Seaton Ballroom at Kleinhans Buffalo Symphony Circle (NY), Fricks Museum-Summer Concert Series (PN), Chautauqua Institution (NY), “New Music New Haven” of Yale University (CT), June in Buffalo Festival (NY), Music Gallery at Toronto (Canada), Shakespeare Theater (Wash. DC), Mallarmé Players Concert 2009 Series (Durham, NC), Music-at-the-ForeFront (OH), the Humanities Festival of the Puerto Rico University, and Stockhausen Music Festival (Germany).

Guillén has received fellowships to conduct studies at the Britten-Pears Institute (England), and worked closely to the German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, later touring with his piece Indianerlieder around US, Canada and Argentina, and also conducting workshops on his vocal music. She has been recommended by the composer in the published Catalogue of Performers for his Music (Stockhausen Foundation).

Since her early debut at one of the tango evenings of the famous Café Homero (Buenos Aires, Arg.), Guillén has performed tango shows along with her husband Alejandro Rutty at the piano in a variety of venues around US. She has recorded a tango CD, Never Too Tango, featuring the participation of several guest artists.

As a “tango” scholar, Guillén wrote two articles for the fore-coming Groves Dictionary of American Music (2nd ed.), the one on “tango” and the biography of “Astor Piazzolla,” and is currently working on a research project on Argentine female tango singers of the 1920s and 1930s. She regularly presents lecture-recitals on “tango” related topics in conferences and university venues.

Guillén has recorded for Innova Records, University of Arizona Recordings, and Kindermusik, Inc. She is a former member of the multidisciplinary ensemble Musica Aperta from Washington DC and a founding member of the word/music experimental group Lake Affect.


She has been the conductor of the Triangle Jewish Chorale since 2010 and faculty member at University of North Carolina at Greensboro since 2007.