Filiberto Ramírez Franco

Works for Cello

Sonata “Amistad” (1981), for cello and piano.

Rapsodia mexicana (1984), for cello solo.

Works for Viola

Sonata (1979), for cello and piano.

Sources:

  • Chab Dzul, L. A. (2021, May 9). Sonata for Viola and Piano by Filiberto Ramírez. La viola desde México. https://lavioladesdemexico.blogspot.com/2021/05/sonata-for-viola-and-piano-by-filiberto.html

  • Furman Schleifer, M., and Galván, G. (2016). Latin American Classical Composers, A Biographical Dictionary. London: Rowman & Littlefield.

Filiberto Ramírez Franco

Mexican composer, born February 18, 1919, died September 24, 2001.

Filiberto Ramírez Franco was born in Meoqui, Chihuahua, on February 18, 1919. He studied piano, chemistry, biology, and pharmacology in Meoqui before moving to Mexico City in 1939. The next year, he began studying composition at the Escuela Nacional de Música of the UNAM, where he graduated in 1955. His primary teachers were Estanislao Mejía, Carmen Azuela de Domínguez, Aurelio Fuentes, and Julián Carrillo. Ramírez’s composition style was nationalistic until he studied with Pedro Michaca Valenzuela in 1960; after their encounter, Ramírez’s works commonly employed polytonality, atonality, and twelve-tone techniques.

In the 50s, Ramírez taught composition, alternating his time between teaching at the UNAM and secondary schools and also joined the group Círculo de Compositores Universitarios. Ramírez was the director of the Escuela Nacional de Música of the UNAM, his alma mater, from 1968 to 1972. In 1982, he received a medal commemorating 1300 years of the state of Bulgaria for his works dedicated to the country; he received another medal in 1985 to honor the 40th anniversary of the triumph of the socialist revolution of Bulgaria. Ramírez was a founding member of the Liga de Compositores de Música de Concierto de México.