About this Artist
Víctor’s exotic and exuberant country surprises us and is heard through the inexhaustible universe of his music: it’s risky, impactful, expressive, playful, dramatic, solid, and perfectly interweaves everyday life into itself to reach the peak of musical expression.
Music that creates images. His works suggest a unique and rich sound journey that due to their versatility, can tell a story by themselves or invigorate narrative when accompanying audiovisual pieces in cinema, theater, or TV.
Just like a musical work, the life of its creator coalesces in movements. Víctor Agudelo’s existence is comprised of these three movements: from his birth in Colombia in 1979 to the consolidation of his style, which is a syncretic dance between traditional and contemporary music. The result: each piece is unique, as is the complex research process from which it arises.
First movement: The rivers
After a childhood amongst tiples (Colombian small guitar), bambucos, and pasillos (Colombian popular music genres) and a youth marked by the first compositions, Víctor joined in 1998 EAFIT University to study with professors Andrés Posada, Moises Bertràn, and Sergio Mesa.
As a student, in 2003, he composed Las Cuatro Chalupas (The four boats), a work that made him a promising composer in his country and launched him internationally.
Second Movement: The continents
Víctor traveled to the United States to take master’s and doctorate studies
in composition, theory, and orchestral conducting at the University of Memphis. Under maestro Kamran Ince’s baton, he incorporated into his musical aesthetics sonorities from other latitudes (Australia, Indonesia, Mongolia, Sardinia). It was during those days that he composed Continental Prism, work that received the Morton Gould Young Composer Award, ASCAP Foundation, New York (2009).
During that time he also composed Pagoda Tale, which sums up his travel to China as assistant conductor and pianist of the University of Memphis Symphony Orchestra, as well as two compositions where he approaches the difficult situation of the armed conflict and the social inequality of his country: Bojayá-Chocó 2002 and Mazorca a $1000.
Third Movement: The return
Víctor returned to Colombia and experimented with a compositional phase that moved away from national references. That approach brought out such compositions as Hexaedro, Epitaphium, and www.ATRESBANDAS.com. But his interest for Colombian influences returned and from that surged such pieces as El Sombrerón (The big hat), the winning work of the 2016 Houston Symphony Orchestra Young Composer Award, Diálogos Montunos (Mountain dialogues) and Circular Sur - piano concerto. This last work was the winner of the 2018 initiative to stimulate Art and Culture (In Spanish: Convocatoria de Estímulos para el Arte y la Cultura 2018), organized by the Secretary of Civic Culture in Medellín.
At present, Víctor's life is still in motion: he is associate professor and researcher of the Music Degree of the Adventist University Corporation (UNAC) and carries out composition projects through commissions and collaborations with artists of international stature.