(b. April 29, 1938, Caracas). Venezuelan composer of orchestral, chamber and electro acoustic works that have been successfully performed across the Americas and in Asia and Europe; he is a pioneer in South American electro acoustic music.
Mr. Del Mónaco studied piano and composition with Moisés Moleiro and Primo Casale in Venezuela, and later at Columbia University, where he received a DMA degree in 1974. He also has a degree in law from Andrés Bello Catholic University in Caracas (1961).
His compositions have been premièred at numerous festivals around the world, such as Berlin (1968), the Columbia-Princeton Tenth Anniversary Festival (1970), the Festival de las Americas y España (1970), the Venice Biennale (1971), the Brussels Electroacoustic Music Festival (1971), and Madrid (1973). They have also been heard at the Inter American Music Festivals of Washington, DC (1974, 1980), the ISCM World Music Days (1976, 1993, 1995) and Perpignan, France (1993), and also at festivals in Brazil, Chile, Cuba, and Mexico, as well as in broadcasts and concerts in the Americas, Asia and Europe.
Many distinguished contemporary music groups have performed his works, such as the American Symphony Chamber Orchestra, New Music of Toronto, the Orchestra of Our Time (New York), the Philadelphia Composers Forum, the SMCQ Ensemble (Montréal), and the ensemble Solars Vortices (France). The American Composers Orchestra (New York), the Cikada Ensemble (Oslo), the Contemporary Music Forum of Washington, Ensemble Aventure (Germany), the Monday Evening Concerts (Los Angeles), Die MusikFabrik (Germany), and the RAI Symphony Orchestra (Rome), among others, have also played his works.
He pioneered electronic music in Venezuela at the former Estudio de Fonologia Musical (Inciba), in 1967. In 1968, he founded the Venezuelan branch of ISCM and is also a founding member and fellow of the Colegio de Compositores de Iberoamerica (Mexico, 1999). From 1969-75, he lived in New York and worked at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center (on an invitation from Mario Davidovsky and Vladimir Ussachevsky), where he experimented extensively in electronic music.
He has received many awards, including the National Prize in Composition (1968), the Premio Nacional de Música of Venezuela (1999) and the Tomás Luis de Victoria Prize (Spain, 2001). Some of his compositions are available on recordings from Airo-Music, Attacca Babel, CRI, Jeunesse Musicales (Venezuela), Pro-Musica, and SupraVox.