VENEZUELA: Renowned Venezuelan composer Gustavo Dudamel attends special premiere of a documentary about his life held in the streets of a low-income neighbourhood in Caracas

Record ID: 574932

  • Title: VENEZUELA: Renowned Venezuelan composer Gustavo Dudamel attends special premiere of a documentary about his life held in the streets of a low-income neighbourhood in Caracas
  • Date: 10th June 2011
  • Summary: CARACAS, VENEZUELA (JUNE 7, 2011) (REUTERS) PEOPLE WALKING SCREENING OF "DUDAMEL: LET THE CHILDREN PLAY" VARIOUS OF BANNERS OF DOCUMENTARY VARIOUS OF FILM DIRECTOR ALBERTO ARVELO (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) FILM DIRECTOR ALBERTO ARVELO, SAYING: "To talk about Dudamel is to talk about an uprising of children from around the world who claim for the universal right to art and music. So, making this film was like making a film about a message, not only from a man, who has an outstanding and fascinating talent. Evidently, this implies a powerful responsibility."
  • Embargoed: 25th June 2011 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of
  • Country: Venezuela
  • Reuters ID: LVAQ3DZYYCX1311LS36XFBR89PP
  • Story Text: Dozens of children from the poor outskirts of Caracas were treated on Tuesday (June 8) to a special first hand screening of a documentary about the life of Venezuelan wunderkind Gustavo Dudamel.
    The low-income neighborhood of La Vega was the chosen location for the premiere of "Dudamel: Let the Children Play" directed by Venezuelan filmmaker Alberto Arvelo.
    The movie tells the story of the 30-year-old conductor, the most famous product of Venezuela's much-lauded network of music schools known as "El Sistema", or "the system."
    Dudamel is the current music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and with talent, charisma and trademark curly locks, he has taken the rarefied world of classical music by storm, drawing comparisons with legends like Leonard Bernstein.
    His successful career has also drawn attention to El Sistema, which recruits students from across the country -- from distant Amazon villages to rough Caracas slums -- to join music schools in which they are given an instrument to play as part of an orchestra.
    Arvelo said the movie was not only about Dudamel, but all the youths involved in the project.
    "To talk about Dudamel is to talk about an uprising of children from around the world who claim for the universal right to art and music. So, making this film was like making a film about a message, not only from a man, who has an outstanding and fascinating talent. Evidently, this implies a powerful responsibility," he said.
    The music education system was founded in 1975 by Jose Abreu, who developed his teaching method to get youngsters off the street with a classical musical education focused on ensemble playing. It now involves about 300,000 Venezuelan children, who are also required to attend regular school in an effort to reduce truancy in violent slums.
    At 18, Dudamel was named director of Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra, Venezuela's premier youth group made up mostly of teenagers picked from the music network.
    Dudamel said that he wanted to spread the message of his country's initiative to the world.
    "A director is nothing without an orchestra. It is the youths, the children, who make the sound every time that I conduct them because a baton does not make sound. My dream is very circumstantial and it is, of course, about somehow taking the message of music, the message of El Sistema, the message of the sound, which is that we have to dream -- imagination is the most important thing and also doing things with true love. There is nothing more beautiful than seeing someone doing the simplest thing with an absolute passion," he said in a news conference.
    Dudamel has shot to rock-star levels of fame with rapturously received concerts heading the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra across the globe. Youth orchestras inspired by Abreu's methods are being set up in places including Los Angeles, Scotland and Spain.
    "Dudamel: Let the Children Play" will hit the screens on Friday (June 10) in over 400 theatres in the United States and Canada.
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