Aruán Ortiz

Born in Santiago de Cuba, pianist, violist, and composer Aruán Ortiz has been an active figure in the progressive jazz and avant-garde scene for more than 20 years. Ortiz’s career includes writing, producing, conducting, and directing music for jazz ensembles, orchestras, dance companies, chamber groups, and feature films, incorporating influences from contemporary classical music, Cuban-Haitian rhythms, and avant-garde improvisation. He consistently strives to break stylistic musical boundaries. Ortiz’s works include “Episodes of an Unforeseen Departure” (2023), premiered by the Harlem Chamber Players; “Piedras de Ida y Vuelta” (2023), premiered by Ensemble Ipse; and “Remaining Tropiques: Then and Now” (2023); the jazz suite “Pastor’s Paradox” (2022), inspired by the political legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., premiered at Teatro Dallas; the multi-disciplinary project “Flamenco Criollo” (2021), premiered at the Flamenco Biennale Nederland; and the score for ballet Santiarican Blues Suite (2011). Ortiz has more than 15 albums as a leader, and has collaborated on more than 30 recordings. As a music researcher and conceptualist, his works express a reverence for the rich diversity present in the music, history, politics, literature, visual arts, oral cultural expressions and traditions of the Afro-descendent communities in the Americas.