Antonio Lauro was born in Ciudad Bolívar, Venezuela. His father was a
barber who sang and played the guitar, but he died when Antonio was five years
old, and the family moved to Caracas. Antonio studied the piano and composition
at the Academia de Música y Declamación, where his teachers included
the distinguished composer Vicente Emilio Sojo (1877-1974). A 1932 concert by
Agustín Barrios, the legendary Paraguayan guitarist and composer, convinced
the young Lauro (already an accomplished folk guitarist) to abandon piano and
violin and concentrate upon the guitar. From 1933, he studied with Ral Borges
(1888-1967), who introduced him to the traditional classical guitar repertory.
In the next decade, Borges pupils would also include Rodrigo Riera, José
Rafael Cisneros, and Alirio Díaz, who was responsible for exposing Lauro's
works to an international audience and introducing them to the likes of Andrés
Segovia and John Williams.
Like many South Americans of his generation, Lauro was a fervent cultural nationalist,
determined to rescue and celebrate his nation's musical heritage. As a member
of the Trio Cantores del Trópico in 1935-43 where he sang bass and played
both guitar and cuatro, Lauro toured nearby countries to introduce them
to Venezuelan music. Lauro was particularly attracted to the myriad colonial
parlour valses created in the previous century by accomplished national
composers such as Ramón Delgado Palacios (1867-1902). Unfailingly melodic,
alternately wistful and brilliant, and characterized by a distinctive syncopation,
such music was precisely the sort of folkloric raw material which the likes
of Smetana or Granados had elevated to national art in Europe. A programme of
such valses by the distinguished Venezuelan pianist Evencio Castellanos
(1914-1984) convinced Lauro that the guitar, too, should have such pieces in
its repertory. Among his first efforts in this genre were the pieces later known
as Tatiana, Andreina, and Natalia, composed sometime between 1938
and 1940; their popularity inspired still others. In addition to his guitar
pieces. Lauro composed dozens of works for orchestra, choir, piano and voice;
many of which remain unpublished. He sometimes experimented with modern compositional
techniques, but most of his guitar music remains essentially on the Calle
real or "main street", an expression used by musicians of Lauro's generation
to refer to a straight and direct route, without distracting harmonic detours.
In 1951-2, the military junta of General Marcos Pérez Jiménez
imprisoned Lauro for his principled belief in democracy. Lauro later shrugged
off the experience, telling his friends that prison was a normal part of life
for the Venezuelan man of his generation. He had continued composing even in
prison, and after his release immediately returned to performing with a pioneering
professional classical guitar trio, the Trio Raúl Borges. In the next decades
Lauro's compositions were published, recorded, and performed throughout the
world, and his contributions to his nation's musical life were recognized and
acknowledged. Lauro was appointed professor of guitar at several distinguished
schools including the Juan José Landaeta Conservatory, and was named president
of the Venezueland Symphony Orchestra. In spite of his modest insistence that
he was a composer rather than a performer, he was persuaded by his friends to
embark upon a solo concert tour which began in Venezuela and culminated in a
triumphant 1980 performance at London's Wigmore Hall. Shortly before his death
in 1986, he was presented with the Premio nacional de música, his
country's highest artistic award.
