One Man's Voice

Consider the life led: Born in late-fifties Uruguay, Miguel del Aguila came of age with the iron boot of a military dictatorship shadowing his country. By age six, a musical prodigy, he was dreaming obsessively about piano keys, seeing them in kitchen drawers, in a roll-top desk. Everything was a piano. And then the boot fell.

When he was fifteen, his parents fled South America and the military regime's "preventive" repression—Miguel supported himself and his brothers by teaching piano. From Montevideo, he eventually moved to Vienna, where "if you are a composer, you are like a semi-god," and evolved into one of the most highly regarded compositional talents of his generation.

In the early nineties, recognized the world over, Miguel del Aguila chose Oxnard, California, over Vienna. He is the 2009 Composer of the Year, honored by the Lancaster Symphony Orchestra with the oldest award of its kind in the nation, and currently lives near the foot of the Santa Monica Mountains in Camarillo. — M.K.

When did you first realize you had musical talents?

Well, when you're a child you don't know what talent means, or what music means; you don't know the names of things. All I remember is that my first memories are always sounds—toys that made sounds. And whatever wasn't intended to make sound, I made it serve the purpose. ... We would have this orchestra, with my brothers. We would get all the pans from the kitchen and I would play the xylophone. We would invent songs and do concerts.

And how old were you at this point?

I would say until I was about six, seven. Then I started going to the conservatory and those things were beneath me [laughs].

Tell us about your experience at the conservatory.

I started violin, and I hated it. ... I kept telling my parents that what I wanted to do was play piano. I was just fascinated by the piano and all those black and white keys. I lost that sense, but I can only compare it to the sexual desire of an adult. I just felt something. ... But they said, "No, you have to learn an instrument that will at least allow you to find a job in an orchestra." After two years of violin, they all realized it was hopeless. I still have the violin—and it still has the scar where I hit it against the wall: a three hundred-year-old violin; my father almost killed me!

I understand you had a very influential teacher as a child.

My first teacher, Maria Herminia Laguarda, was really one of my mentors. She was eighty-five when I started with her. She was very strict, from the old school of music. She was born in eighteen-something and lived in Europe. She knew Franz Lizst, St. Saens, Ravel, Debussy, all these people... In Montevideo there were these old auction houses, and they all had pianos. I would go down the street and see a piano and sit for hours; they had to drag me out. ... So I went to my first piano lesson, and I remember this woman, she looked mean, and she said, "Sit. Play something so I can hear." I don't know what I started playing, but she looked at me like she was really upset. She said, "You have been learning for many years." I said, "No, I never learned piano."

Miguel del Aguila’s first piano teacher, Maria Herminia Laguarda (left), was born in the nineteenth century and passed down a semblance of the Old World. That formality, however, belies the composer’s simmering wit and rebellious nature, both of which come to life in his very modern music.

Explain the events that ultimately led you to Ventura County.

In 1973, the military coup took place. It was a bit like Nazi Germany: either you left, or you didn't know what would happen to you. ... People started leaving in droves. There was this famous graffiti writing on the port of Montevideo that said, "The last one to leave, turn the lights off." ... My parents were against militarism, so they decided to leave to the United States ... Their plans were to be here and in about six months get us from Uruguay.

Who all was left?

My older brother, myself, and my two younger brothers. I was fifteen when my parents left. We thought, "Oh, we can do this for six months." The problem was that suddenly things got much worse; the dirty war really exploded, and so they couldn't come back and we couldn't leave. Six months turned into four years, and during those four years I was pretty much my brothers' parent. ... Finally, when I was twenty, I came to America. I returned my brothers to my parents and said, "That's it. Goodbye. I'm going to live my life now."

After graduating from The San Francisco Conservatory of Music, you traveled around Europe and decided to live in Vienna. Why Vienna?

Everywhere I went, people looked up to me as a musician because I was coming from Vienna. In Europe, it is still a big place to be. ... In Vienna there is nothing more important you can achieve than being a Philharmonic musician, and if you are a composer you are like a semi-god or something. I sort of enjoyed that. Whereas in America, you are just ... people laugh at you: Ah, a composer, and what do you do for a living?

Let's talk about the fundamental differences between Europe and America in attitude toward the Arts.

I think before I say anything, I must say that I ultimately decided to come to America ... I came by choice to a place like Oxnard, with very little culture compared to Vienna. I'd rather be here than there, but I always regret the fact that here there is no respect for people who create things. Austria spends something like thirty percent of their state budget for the Arts.

Which leads to the big question: Why leave a cultural stronghold and move to Oxnard?

Nothing is black and white. They invest a lot of money in the Arts, but a lot of the art they invest in is the art that will generate tourism. ... It's like music became a marketed Mickey Mouse in those countries. On top of that, it's like a status symbol. In California you would drive a Porsche; there, you'd have to be seen in concerts, you'd have to be seen at [art openings], even if you know nothing about it. ... I realized that music became sort of a phony thing. I didn't want to be surrounded by all these people who are next to me just because I'm something they can hang on themselves as a status symbol. I hang around with a composer.

You have an extreme, like Vienna, and then you have Oxnard. How do we get some of that here; how do we change the perception to appreciate the Arts?

I think it's simple. Just do a yearly evaluation of all teachers and fire those who don't produce results. You are dealing with the lives of very young people, and the moment you are not good, you should be out. ... Demand that parents take care of their responsibility to do their share in educating their kids—which they are not doing. They want to get rid of their kids as many hours as possible, so education became sort of a babysitting service.

You used to run an interesting music program in Oxnard called Voices. Tell us a little about that.

Voices was a very experimental thing: kids learning about the whole process of making music and interpreting it. I knew things were going to be difficult, and I wanted to go to the place where I was most needed. I started the first group in this school in La Colonia.

It's a very depressed area.

Yeah, and the children have really very little. When I went there I realized—the same realization all over again—it's not the kids, it's their environment. One of the main problems was that they had no role models. ... We started doing concerts, and slowly things got better and we started getting results. Now some of these kids are going to some of the best music schools in the country.

What was your goal with the Voices program?

Just to open the horizons of these kids and work on the basic things they need. Some of these kids are very smart, and they are willing to work hard if they see some direction of where their work is going to take them.

It must have been very time consuming.

Well, that's the thing I underestimated [laughs]. First of all, I spent most of my time with things like fighting with the janitor of a school who doesn't want to bring what we need to the rehearsals because he doesn't like me. And the people at this other school boycotted everything I did because they'd rather have their kids dance folkl—rico. I think folkl—rico is great, but... In areas like La Colonia, most people want to prevent kids from going the bad way by reinforcing their values and their culture, sort of overdosing them on their own culture. And I just went with a totally different approach. I already had my culture—I know where I was born. These kids also know where they were born; they have to be helped in becoming citizens of America, citizens of the world. ... I wanted to show these kids that they can sing in Japanese if they want to. ... It's not that I think any less of folklore. I use it and respect it a lot. My music would be nothing without folklore from Latin America. But I think these kids need to be able to compete with the world—the real world.

Artistically, do you see some changes occurring in the music world, a shift in style?

I think that during happy times, art tends to become a bit superficial. Culturally, it was always like that. I think those carefree times ended on September 11, 2001, and the arts are going to reflect that.

How do you begin a composition? You're looking at a blank piece of paper, and...

I love that.

You do?

The Arts Live On

This interview was made possible by Focus on the Masters, a Ventura-based nonprofit art appreciation program that documents, preserves, and presents the works and lives of accomplished contemporary artists. It's the only biographical resource project of its kind in Ventura County, and a local treasure that depends on community support. To find out more about FOTM, including how you can donate or become a member, call 805.653.2501 or visit FocusOnTheMasters.com.

More on Miguel

Miguel del Aguila's new CD, "Sal—n Buenos Aires," will be released this October, offering a range of the composer's chamber music. Described as "an étagère crowded with souvenirs of the composer's earlier and present lives," the music is flavored with the intricate folk rhythms of Latin America, the repeating patterns of West Coast minimalism, the theatricality of European opera, and the pop sensibility of Los Angeles. For more information, visit MigueldelAguila.com.