A Colombian name has been rising through America's classical music ranks, and Juan Felipe Molano has a front-row view. The Medellín-raised conductor, now music director of the Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra, says Latino musicians in the US have shifted from novelty act to signal of quality — a change with real weight for anyone who follows orchestral life on their travels.
The evidence is easy to spot. Venezuelan Gustavo Dudamel now leads the New York Philharmonic after 17 seasons with the LA Philharmonic. Carlos Miguel Prieto of Mexico conducts the North Carolina Symphony, and Giancarlo Guerrero, born in Nicaragua and raised in Costa Rica, leads the Sarasota Orchestra. Colombians are there too: Lina Gonzalez-Granados is resident conductor of LA Opera, and cellist Santiago Cañon-Valencia — a 2019 Tchaikovsky Competition silver medallist — has performed with the Kansas City and Phoenix symphonies.
The numbers back the shift, up to a point. Per the League of American Orchestras, Hispanic music directors rose from 5% to 9.9% in the decade to 2023, and musicians from 2.5% to 4.8%. That still trails the 20.5% Hispanic share of the US population, which is partly why Molano keeps one foot in education. He has spent years building youth ensembles — from Colombia's Batuta network, which has served more than a million children, to Youth Orchestra Los Angeles and, since 2019, Seattle. Watching a young player climb from first rehearsal to concert, he says, is what refreshes him.
His own path reads like a musical migration. A Czech guitarist uncle who fled World War II taught at the University of Antioquia's conservatory in Medellín; Molano later played clarinet in a town band in Andes, Antioquia, studied with Colombian pianist Teresita Gomez, trained at the Vienna Conservatory under a former Herbert von Karajan assistant, and cites El Sistema founder José Antonio Abreu as a key influence. Posts in Yucatán, Salinas and Los Angeles followed.
His programming shows the range he thinks Latino musicians bring. This Halloween he conducts the Boise Philharmonic through Wagner, Mussorgsky, Saint-Saëns and John Williams's 'Jaws' and 'Harry Potter' suites; in November he builds a Morelia Music Festival programme pairing Piazzolla with Britten and a world premiere.
For travellers, this matters: orchestras in Seattle, New York, Los Angeles and beyond are programming Latin American repertoire and leaders at the highest level, and Medellín's conservatory culture and town-band traditions are worth seeking out on any visit to Antioquia.
