News — Aruán Ortiz

Jazz Magazine [France]: Three Questions for Aruán Ortiz

In an interview with Aruán Ortiz for the December/January issue of Jazz Magazine (France) he talks about his work with the James Brandon Lewis Quartet and inspiration for his latest album, Creole Renaissance.

Aruán OrtizJanuary 9, 2026Comment

Aruán Ortiz Named a 2026 Fellowship Finalist in Music Composition by the Cintas Foundation

Introducing our 2025 Fellowship Finalists: In Music Composition - Aruán Ortiz in his own words:

My work as a composer, pianist, and musical researcher is rooted in lived experiences and the collective memory of Afro-diasporic communities across the Americas. It is a continuous process of transformation where sound becomes a way to understand myself and the world around me.

Aruán OrtizJanuary 7, 2026Comment

Roulette Tapes: Aruán Ortiz: The Keys of Inspiration

Pianist/composer Aruán Ortiz, classically trained in Cuba and influenced by jazz musicians from Chick Corea to Muhal Richard Abrams, narrates his journey over excerpts from his 2025 concert at Roulette pushing the boundaries of musical Afro-diasporic traditions and storytelling. A 2024 Guggenheim Fellow, we'll hear solos and ensemble works with clarinetist Don Byron, flutist Nicole Mitchell, and percussionist Mauricio Herrera alongside strings and vocalists.

Aruán OrtizDecember 31, 2025Comment

Afrolatin@ Forum: The Creative Mind of Aruán Ortiz by Ayanna Legros

This insightful interview for Afrolatin@ Forum by Ayanna Legros explores the creative universe of Aruán Ortiz and his Cuban-Haitian heritage.

Aruán OrtizDecember 19, 2025Comment

Creole Renaissance: ★★★★ from Downbeat magazine

Laura SitkinDecember 17, 2025Comment

LINER NOTES: An Interview about the Inspiration for Creole Renaissance

In this episode of the LINER NOTES podcast, Aruán describes the inspiration that he was able to draw from the Négritude movement that originated in Paris in the early part of the 20th century for his latest album, Creole Renaissance.

Aruán OrtizOctober 1, 2025Comment

Rialta Magazine: Image, Music, History

“We generally appreciate musicians and composers for their musical talents, which Aruán Ortiz possesses in abundance, but we rarely see composers as intellectuals, as people who engage in articulate and coherent thought. Aruán Ortiz is a composer of high intellectual caliber, a characteristic that has been consistent throughout his work.”

Aruán OrtizSeptember 1, 2025Comment

Unlimit Jazz Magazine: IL “RINASCIMENTO CREOLO” DEL PIANISTA ARUAN ORTIZ: NUOVO ALBUM E UNA LUNGA CONVERSAZIONE CON L’ARTISTA CUBANO

Aruán is interviewed by Unlimit Jazz magazine (Italy) about his Flamenco Criollo project and upcoming album, Creole Renaissance.

Aruán OrtizAugust 28, 2025Comment

Aruán Ortiz receives major award from American Academy of Arts and Letters

Pianist and composer Aruán Ortiz is one of two “composers of extraordinary gifts” awarded with the Goddard Lieberson Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Composer Shawn Okpebholo also received this fellowship as part of the 2025 Awards in Music honoring 17 established and emerging composers.

Aruán OrtizMarch 13, 2025Comment

Aruán Ortiz named 2024 Guggenheim Fellow in Music Composition

We are so thrilled to announce that Aruán Ortiz has been named Guggenheim Fellow in Music Composition 2024 by one of the most distinguished foundations in the world.

It is marvelous such a recognition to his work, and to be in a class of so many forward-thinking academics, artists, scientists, intellectuals, composers, dancers, writers, and researchers, whose work has revolutionized this world.

Laura SitkinApril 19, 2024Comment

British magazine Morning Star interviews Aruán Ortiz on the release of his album Pastor’s Paradox

So listen closely to Pastor’s Paradox. It speaks, improvises, and melodizes our times too, with Ortiz’s rampant keys, the bowed ground-work of Dhar and St Louis, Aklaff’s finessing drums, and Byron’s curlicuing notes adding their lucid messages.

Aruán OrtizFebruary 28, 2024Comment

"From different angles:" Nuno Catarino interviews Aruán Ortiz for Jazz Portugal

Pianist Aruán Ortiz practices contemporary jazz where he mixes different references creatively. In 2023, he released the album “Serranias – Sketchbook for Piano Trio” (Intakt), and is preparing to release, via Clean Feed, “Pastor’s Paradox”. On the occasion of his visit to Coimbra, we spoke with the pianist: an exclusive interview where Ortiz tells us about his influences, his career, and his music.

Aruán OrtizFebruary 28, 2024Comment

Aruán Ortiz named "International Musician of the year by Jazz Portugal Magazine!!!

A very original pianist, Aruán Ortiz practices contemporary jazz where he mixes different references creatively. Under his name, Ortiz has built an increasingly solid discography: “Hidden Voices” (2016), with Eric Revis and Gerald Cleaver; “Cub(an)is” (2017), solo piano; “Live In Zurich” (2018), with Brad Jones and Chad Taylor; “Random Dances and (A)tonalities” (2018), with Don Byron; “Inside Rhythmic Falls” (2020), with Andrew Cyrille and Mauricio Herrera. 2023 was a memorable year for the Cuban-born pianist: in March he published “Serranias – Sketchbook for Piano Trio” (Intakt) and in August he published “Prophecy”, a trio recording with Ivo Perelman and Lester St. Louis. On his most recent album, “Pastor's Paradox” (released by the Portuguese Clean Feed), Aruán Ortiz sought inspiration from Martin Luther King Jr. and is excellently accompanied by musicians such as Don Byron, Pheeroan akLaff and Lester St. Louis, who realized a original music with absolute brilliance. In April last year, the pianist showcased his vibrant pianism in an extraordinary concert at the Convento de São Francisco, in Coimbra.

Aruán OrtizFebruary 28, 2024Comment

What the press said about Aruán Ortiz's Pastor's Paradox in 2023

So listen closely to Pastor’s Paradox. It speaks, improvises, and melodizes our times too, with Ortiz’s rampant keys, the bowed ground-work of Dhar and St Louis, Aklaff’s finessing drums, and Byron’s curlicuing notes adding their own lucid messages. –Chris Searle, Morning Star–

On this project, as a pianist, violist, and composer, Aruán Ortiz has created a 21st-century chamber music/jazz work that celebrates the power of music to represent the enduring influence of history... to offer us hope for a better future and musical prayers for a more peaceful world. –Dee Dee McNeil, Musical Memoirs–

Aruán OrtizFebruary 28, 2024Comment

Aruán Ortiz invited to conduct his masterclass "Deconstructing Composition to Build your Creative Process at MUK University in Viena.

Acclaimed pianist and composer Aruán Ortiz will conduct a Masterclass about Composition and Improvisation titled "Deconstructing Composition to Build your Creative Process at MUK University in Viena, on Friday, February 23rd, 2024.

Aruán OrtizFebruary 20, 2024Comment

Aruán Ortiz artist in residence with the Barbara Bruckmüeller Jazz Orchestra in Vienna.

The Cuban pianist, violist, and composer Aruán Ortiz, who lives in New York and Barcelona, will be a guest with the Barbara Bruckmüller Jazz Orchestra in February 2024 for a seven-day residency. Aruán has been active in the New York progressive jazz and avant-garde scenes in the United States for more than 20 years. His music spans a range of musical styles and has been interpreted by contemporary classical and jazz ensembles, dance companies, and in feature films and multimedia works. A conceptualist and music researcher, Aruán's music consolidates his Afro-Cuban and Haitian heritage with avant-garde and progressive jazz and contemporary classical language.

Aruán OrtizFebruary 15, 2024Comment

Aruán Ortiz's career featured on Latin Jazz Network written by Raul da Gama

By actively throwing overboard melodic, structural, and harmonic hooks that have become expressively blunted from overuse, he builds from what might – or might not – be left. This instinctive radicalism might make Mr Ortiz a source of endless controversy in many corners of the musical world. But Mr Ortiz is not in the business of audience-ingratiating beauty typical of commercial music. He aims to silence the mind just enough to make room for new pathways of perception.

He creates music in which nothing – no subplot in the narrative; no emotion of the characters or reaction to both those aspects can be omitted, not a single turn of the melody, not even a single modulation. It requires the strictest attention to every detail of expression, a fine – but not over-refined – execution of each intonation. And so, when he plays – and exhorts his performing partners to play – you can be sure that there is a real sense that responses come from deep within the music’s substance.

Aruán OrtizJanuary 31, 2024Comment