The Alturas Duo

See our latest review in the Austin American Statesman

Hailed as playing with "...marvelous virtuosity..."

The Washington Post

The Alturas Duo has been recognized as one of the most engaging ensembles performing in the chamber music world today. The only group of its kind, the Duo was formed with the idea of playing South American and classical music by bringing together the unusual combination of the viola, charango and guitar, and in doing so, creating passionate music that moves at ease between the Baroque, South American folk rhythms and new pieces written especially for the Duo.

The Duo has performed in Brazil, Canada, Chile, Bolivia, throughout the US and Puerto Rico including recitals at: Carnegie Hall, Merkin Hall, the Smithsonian Institute, the Music Mountain Chamber Music Series, La Guitarra California, and the 34th International Viola Congress. Always in search of new music and collaborations, the Duo has worked with artists as diverse as: charango virtuoso Ernesto Cavour, guitarist and composer Horacio Salinas; flutists James Strauss, Sergio Pallottelli and quena virtuoso Marcelo Pena-Lobo; pianist Polly Ferman and Argentine bandoneon legend, Daniel Binelli; the Choral Arts Society of Washington D.C., Coral Cantigas, the Voce Choir of Hartford; the Connecticut Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra and the Symphony of Southeast Texas. The Duo has held residencies at the Festival Eleazar de Carvalho in Fortaleza, Brazil and at the Hartt School of Music; has recorded for BRIOSO and NAXOS records and has been a featured performer on NPR. The Duo has worked closely with many composers and has premiered dozens of commissions, arrangements and transcriptions including recent works by; Javier Farias, Raimundo Penaforte, Alexander Silas Walker, Yovianna Garcia and Sergio Igor Chnee. The Duo took First Prize at the 2006 New England International Chamber Music Competition, and won the 2009 CMA / ASCAP (Chamber Music America / American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) Award for Adventurous Programming. Finally, the Duo was named a "Goodwill Ambassador" for the Chilean-American Foundation and is looking forward to working with them to help raise money for the victims of the recent earthquake in the south of Chile.

Click to read www.chileusfoundation.org/caf_news.htm

The 2009-10 concert season will see the Duo maintaining a busy schedule of concerts, master classes and lectures in Canada, the United States, Puerto Rico, Bolivia and Brazil. There will be collaborations with flutists Jessica Warren-Acosta and James Strauss as well as with Coral Cantigas of Washington, D.C., the New Haven Chorale, the Crescendo Choir and the Waterbury Symphony.

The name Alturas (Spanish for heights) is derived from the poem "Alturas de Macchu Picchu" by Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda (1904-1973).

Carlos Boltes, was born in Santiago, Chile where he began his musical studies by learning the charango from his brother Giovanni Vaccani, later mastering that instrument while touring extensively throughout South America as a member of the Chilean group Barrocco Andino. He holds a Bachelor�s Degree from the Universidad Cat�a de Chile and a Master's Degree from Carnegie Mellon University both in viola performance. His main teachers have been: Enrique López, Atar Arad, Larry Dutton and Steve Larson. He has been principal violist of the Orquesta de Cámara del Teatro Municipal de Santiago and the Connecticut Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra and has recorded for Naxos, Brioso and CBS Records. Mr. Boltes has been a recipient of the Boston Fund Individual Artist Fellowship and an Andes Foundation Performance Grant and is currently on the faculty of the Eleazar de Carvalho Music Festival in Fortaleza, Brazil and the Hartt School Community Division of the University of Hartford, in West Hartford, Connecticut.

Scott Hill, a native of Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada, earned an Honours Bachelor of Arts degree in music from Lakehead University with Sean Mundy and a Masters degree in guitar performance and a Graduate Professional Diploma in chamber performance from the Hartt School of Music where he studied with Richard Provost. Mr. Hill has performed and lectured throughout Canada, the United States and South America as both a soloist and chamber musician and most recently premiered Thomas Schuttenhelm's "Balada" for soprano and guitar and "Pequena cancion" by Javier Farias. Mr. Hill is a Canada Council for the Arts grant recipient and has performed in master classes for some of today's finest musicians including Oscar Ghiglia, John Williams and the Miami String Quartet. Currently, Mr. Hill is on the faculty at the Hartt School Community Division of the University of Hartford, West Hartford, Connecticut and the Eleazar de Carvalho Festival in Fortaleza, Brazil.