Fredy Reyna
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| Fredy Reyna | |
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| Born | April 3, 1917 Caracas, Venezuela |
| Died | March 26, 2001 Caracas, Venezuela |
Fredy Reyna was a Venezuelan musician, arranger and performer, regarded as the indisputed master of the Venezuelan cuatro, which he elevated to the level of a concert instrument, and one of his country's most important cultural figures in the 20th century.
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[edit] Early life
Fredy Reyna was born in Caracas, Venezuela, April 3, 1917. From a very young age he showed great curiosity and interest in art in all its manifestations. His father, Don Federico Reyna, cultivated several arts and was an amateur musician, photographer and painter. This influenced the young Fredy in his work and life.
Early in his life, he received the rudiments of music from his father at the piano. In 1933, he started private guitar lessons from maestro Raul Borges. At the age of 18 Fredy Reyna enrolled in the Escuela de Musica y Declamación in Caracas (today called "Conservatorio José Ángel Lamas"), where he completed the first four (of six) years of classical guitar studies. His bright intelligence and his necessity to experiment with all the sounds he could muster, quickly branded him as a bad student for not being able to easily assimilate the rigorous musical study methods of that time.
In 1936, he enrolled in the Escuela de Artes Plásticas, from where he obtained a degree as Professor of Fine Arts in 1939.
[edit] Life and career
In 1939, having graduated as a professor of Fine Arts and Drawing, he began to exert warmly his educational vocation by teaching classes in the “Escuela Experimental Venezuela”.
Between 1947 and 1948, he travelled to Paris with his wife where he studied stagecraft in the Ecole d'Art Apliqueé a l'Industrie and a course in guignol with Gastón Baty, while she continued Ballet studies.
Back in Venezuela, in 1948, motivated by the theft of his prized classical guitar, he decided to switch to the cuatro, the Venezuelan national instrument. That same year, he "discovered" and recorded Ignacio Figueredo, a popular arpist whose career he helped launch. Around that time, he came up with the alternate tuning method that became one of his landmark developments and lifelong research topic.
In 1949, the teacher Fredy Reyna directed the Marionette School of the Ministry of Education and that same year he wrote his first cuatro method, published in 1957. It was dedicated to Raul Borges, his former teacher.
In 1958 Fredy Reyna traveled to Europe where he remained until 1966. In that long period he dedicated himself to research the music for lute and vihuela of the XVI century. He attended courses to systematize and to document his knowledge in diverse categories. Upon his return to Venezuela he made an extensive concert tour as a soloist throughout the country, dictated cuatro courses, and produced and recorded several albums together with artists like Alirio Diaz, Conny Méndez and Morella Muñoz.
His innate generosity, along with his vocation as an educator and his love of children took him to collect toys, puppets and marionettes for more than 50 years. he made exact replicas of a part of these toys so that the children could touch them and to see how they were made. he even taught toy factories how to construct them.
Fredy Reyna dedicated a part of his life to the manufacture of musical instruments in his workshop. There he spent long hours experimenting in his search for new sonorous applications for his inseparable cuatro.
In 1978, by initiative of his relatives and on the occasion of the artist's 60th birthday, the Foundation known as Fredy Reyna initiated its cultural work, with the goal to offer courses of artistic and integral initiation: Music, Plastic Arts and Theater. In 1990 he received the maximum recognition for a popular artist, the National Prize of Culture (Premio Nacional de Cultura) awarded by the CONAC. In 1993 he finished his new method for the cuatro, which he called ALFA BETA CUATRO, published in 1996.
In 1994 his health began to deteriorate, and he died in Caracas on March 26, 2001, leaving a great void in Venezuela's cultural endeavor.
[edit] Discography
1. As a Cuatro Soloist
- Método de Cuatro - 200 fórmulas de acompañamiento - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1956
- Cuatro Suites de “Cuatro” - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1957,1958
- América en el Cuatro - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1958
- Fredy Reyna - Solos de Cuatro - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1972
- Fredy Reyna - Solos de Cuatro - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1981
- Danzas y Canciones para los Niños - Caracas: Fundación Fredy Reyna, 1981
- Homenaje al Libertador Simón Bolívar - Solos de cuatro - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1983
- El cuatro de Fredy Reyna - Caracas: Fundación Fredy Reyna, FUNDEF, 1994
- Homenaje a Fredy Reyna - Caracas: D'Empaire Reyna & Asociados, 1997
- Fredy Reyna, cuatro solista - Caracas: Deltaven-PDV, 1997
2. As a publisher
- Song
- Carlos Enrique Reyna Serenata - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1958
- Morella Muñoz Canciones de América - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1958
- Conny Méndez A mi Caracas - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1967
- Paco Vera Cantos y Corridos - Caracas: Fundación Fredy Reyna, 1992
- Poetry
- Aquiles Nazoa Poesía y humor de Aquiles Nazoa - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1958
- Miguel Otero Silva Elegía coral a Andrés Eloy Blanco - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1958
- Piano music
- Rosita Montes and Luisa Amelia Azerm (accompanied on the cuatro by Raul Borges, Ramón E. Azerm and Fredy Reyna) Piano a cuatro manos. Música instrumental del siglo pasado - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1956
- Luisa Elena Paesano - Valses de Luisa Elena Paesano - Caracas: Ediciones Fredy Reyna, 1969
3. As artistic director
- El Ultimo Cañón - Caracas: Sociedad de Amigos de la Música, 1956
- Tun tun In addition to artistic direction, Reyna played cuatro, scraper, furruco (Venezuelan friction drum), bells, pandeiro and sang background vocals. - Caracas Fundación Fredy Reyna, Dimagen, 1980.
4. As recording engineer/editor
- Alirio Díaz and Morella Muñoz Alirio y Morella: Canciones, tonadas y aguinaldos venezolanos - Caracas: Espiral, 1967
- Abraham Abreu Curso de Iniciación Musical - Caracas; Inciba 1968
5. As musical guest (solo cuatro)
- Selección de Música de Venezuela - Caracas Compañía Shell de Venezuela, 1957
- Serenata Guayanesa El canto popular venezolano - Aguinaldos - Caracas, 1976
