Biography

Alberto Villalpando (born 21 November 1940, in La Paz) is a Bolivian composer. Villalpando began his musical training in Potosí under Santiago Velásquez and Padre José Díaz Gainza. From 1958 he studied at the Conservatory of Buenos Aires with Alberto Ginastera, Pedro Sáenz, Abraham Jurafsky and Roberto García Morillo, and in 1963–64 at the Latin American Center for Higher Musical Studies (CLAEM) in Buenos Aires with Olivier Messiaen, Riccardo Malipiero, Luigi Dallapiccola, Alberto Ginastera, Bruno Maderna and Aaron Copland. There, in collaboration with Miguel Angel Rondano, he developed a sound installation for an exhibition of the painter Carlos Squirru.

In 1964 he became head of the State Film Institute of Bolivia, and in 1967 was appointed director of the Music Department of the Bolivian Ministry of Culture. In addition, he served as professor of composition and director of the National Conservatory of La Paz and the music seminar of the Universidad Católica Boliviana and was Bolivian cultural attaché to France. In 1998 he was awarded the National Prize for Bolivian Culture.In addition to orchestral works such as Phantastischen Liturgie, Strukturen (for piano and orchestra), and Von der Liebe, der Furcht und dem Schweigen (for piano and chamber orchestra), he composed ballet and film music, works for chamber orchestra, and Sonnengesang for soloists, choir and orchestra. While studying electroacoustic music, he benefited from the tape recorder, producing Bolivianos...! in Leo Küpper's recording studio. Later he drew on electroacoustic sound and the technical developments offered by MIDI.