Octavio Vázquez

Octavio Vázquez Rodríguez (born September 10, 1972) is a Galician-American New York-based composer of classical music. Biography Born in Santiago de Compostela (Galicia, Spain), Vázquez spontaneously started writing music at age 7. Not knowing how to notate music at that age, he created his own system. At age 12 he became music director at St. Peter’s church in Lugo. In 1989 he moved to Madrid, where he studied at the Adolfo Salazar Conservatory and the Madrid Royal Conservatory, taking degrees in piano, collaborative piano, and theory. While in Madrid he also worked as assistant conductor to Oscar Gershensohn and pursued graduate studies in conducting and musicology. After winning the prestigious Barrié de la Maza Foundation Scholarship, he went on to study composition at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, and afterwards obtained his doctorate from the University of Maryland, College Park, where he was on a full Fellowship. Since 1999 he resides in New York City. He is primarily interested in the “…emotional impact of his music and direct communication with the listener”. His music has been described as “…a burning torch for the next century” by Mark Greenfest, of the New Mus