Faculty of the Barcelona Festival of song
The strength of the Barcelona Festival of Song lies in its faculty, a team of internationally recognized performers and researchers of the Latin American and Iberian vocal repertoire.
PATRICIA CAICEDO, M.D., Ph.D
Leading Voice of Iberian and Latin American Art Song
Patricia Caicedo is a soprano, musicologist, physician, author, and internationally recognized authority on Latin American and Iberian art song. For more than three decades, her work has brought this repertoire into concert halls, universities, publications, recordings, and classical voice curricula worldwide.
She has released eleven albums in Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, and Indigenous languages and has authored books, critical editions, and scholarly articles that have shaped the study and performance of the repertoire. Her publications include The Latin American Art Song: Sounds of the Imagined Nations and We Are What We Listen To: The Impact of Music on Individual and Social Health. She is also the founder of Mundo Arts, a music publisher, record label, and digital platform dedicated to making this music accessible internationally.
As the founder and director of the Barcelona Festival of Song®, Patricia has created an international center for the study, performance, preservation, and renewal of Latin American and Iberian vocal music. BFOS participants work directly with her on repertoire, language, cultural context, performance practice, and interpretation. Each singer receives a carefully curated repertoire program shaped around their voice, experience, artistic identity, and professional goals.
Patricia holds a Ph.D. in Musicology from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and an M.D. from the Escuela Colombiana de Medicina. She was a visiting scholar at the Center for Iberian and Latin American Music at the University of California, Riverside, and a board member of the International Music Council. She currently serves on the Board of the New York Singing Teachers’ Association and as an expert evaluator of European Commission research projects. patriciacaicedo.com
Walter Aaron Clark, Ph.D.
Renowned Scholar in Spanish and Latin American Music
Professor Walter Aaron Clark is a distinguished expert in the music of Spain and Latin America. He is the founder and director of the Center for Iberian and Latin American Music at the University of California, Riverside, where he serves as a Distinguished Professor.
Prof. Clark is the series editor for Oxford University Press's Currents in Latin American and Iberian Music, and he oversees the Ibero-American area for Grove Music Online as editor-in-chief. He also serves on the editorial boards of prestigious publications, including Revista de Musicología, Monumentos de la música española, and Música em contexto.
He earned his doctorate in musicology from UCLA in 1992, completing his dissertation under the mentorship of the late Robert M. Stevenson. In addition to his academic achievements, Prof. Clark holds performance degrees in classical guitar from the North Carolina School of the Arts (B.M.), where he studied with Jesús Silva and performed in a master class with Andrés Segovia, and the University of California, San Diego (M.A.), where he studied with Pepe Romero.
For his exceptional contributions to the preservation of Spanish culture, Prof. Clark was named Comendador de la Órden de Isabel la Católica by the Spanish King, a prestigious recognition of his work in promoting and preserving Spanish music and heritage.
Anna Martí Mallorquí
Born in Girona, Catalunya, Anna is a journalist and linguist. She has devoted most of her life to perfect her mother tongue, the Catalan. She has been trained with some of the most important experts in Catalan language achieving the highest degrees of Catalan spoken and written.
LENINE SANTOS, PH.D
Lenine Santos: Leading Interpreter of Brazilian Art Song
Born in Brasília, Brazil, Lenine Santos is recognized as one of the foremost interpreters of the Brazilian art song of his generation. He holds a Doctorate in Voice from the Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP), with a dissertation dedicated to the study of the Brazilian Art Song, establishing him as a leading authority on this repertoire.
Lenine began his musical journey as a violinist in the String Orchestra of SESI before transitioning to voice studies at the Brasília School of Music. He honed his craft under the guidance of the renowned singer Niza de Castro Tank, shaping his career as a distinguished vocalist.
With several recordings dedicated to Brazilian Art Song, Lenine has played a pivotal role in preserving and promoting this repertoire. Since 2012, he has been a valued member of the faculty at the Barcelona Festival of Song, where he shares his expertise on the interpretation of Brazilian and Latin American art songs.
In addition to his work with the Festival, Lenine is a professor of voice at the Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, where he continues to mentor aspiring singers, inspiring them to explore and perform Brazil’s rich vocal tradition.
Nico gutierreZ, dma
Dr. Nico Gutierrez is a Colombian-American composer, conductor, and educator whose work spans concert music, multimedia, and interdisciplinary collaboration. His music has been performed by the Santa Fe Symphony, International Contemporary Ensemble, Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá, and artists and ensembles throughout the United States and internationally. His vocal work has led to collaborations with Austin Opera, Fort Worth Opera, Ópera de Colombia, and Border CrosSing, while his work in film and television includes projects for A&E, CBS, HBO Max, Netflix, and Paramount+. He currently serves as Assistant Professor of Music at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta.
Gutierrez’s relationship with the Barcelona Festival of Song has been central to his artistic development. He has served as composer-in-residence in 2014, 2019, 2022, 2024, and 2026, experiences that shaped his artistic voice and deepened his engagement with Latin American and Iberian art song. He now serves as Director of the Festival’s Composition Course, bringing more than a decade of experience with the Festival to his mentorship of emerging composers.
Central to his teaching is the belief that developing an individual artistic voice requires curiosity, and engagement with musical traditions beyond the conventional canon. He views composition as an essential extension of the Festival’s mission to expand and decolonize music education: celebrating historically underrepresented repertoire and creating the repertoire of the future. To him, the Festival is a living vehicle for a new canon, bringing composers and performers together to create, develop, perform, and preserve new work.
Having experienced the Festival first as a developing composer himself, Gutierrez is committed to creating that same space for others, one in which composers can take artistic risks, strengthen their craft, and discover with greater clarity what they want their music to say.
Margarida Ullate estanyol
Margarida Ullate y Estanyol is the current director of the are of Sound and Audiovisual, one of the four documentary units of the Biblioteca de Cataluña. She has a degree in Library Science and Documentation from the University of Barcelona. She also studied piano at the Academia Marshall. She has worked in the Bergnes de las Casas Library, the Archive of the Gran Teatro del Liceo and, the Music Department of the Cambridge University Library where she expended nine months. In 1996 she started working at the Library of Catalonia. She is an active member of the Asociación Española de Documentación Musical and the secretary of the National Archives Commission of the International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives.
Nikos stavlas, ph.d
Pianist and Researcher in Piano Performance Practice
Born in Greece, Nikos holds a PhD in Piano Performance Practice from Goldsmiths, University of London, where he studied under Keith Potter and Andrew Zolinsky. His research focuses on Ludwig van, a film and musical composition about Beethoven by the Argentinian composer Mauricio Kagel.
A distinguished performer, Nikos has participated in numerous competitions, earning two first prizes in Pan-Hellenic competitions and two second prizes in the G. Thymis Competition in Greece. He has performed as a soloist with orchestras in Greece and Albania and has presented solo and chamber music recitals across Greece, Albania, Italy, Spain, Belgium, the USA, and the United Kingdom.
Since 2014, Nikos has been a dedicated member of the faculty at the Barcelona Festival of Song, collaborating with soprano Patricia Caicedo on several recordings of Latin American and Catalan art songs. His work blends artistry and scholarship, contributing to the promotion and interpretation of this rich musical repertoire.
Rosa Montals
Rosa is graduated in Library Science and Documentation from the University School of Library and Information Science of Barcelona, ith piano studies at the Isaac Albéniz Conservatory of Music in Girona and the Higher Conservatory of Music of the Liceo. She is specialized in the treatment and description of printed music. Rosa has collaborated in the organization of the archive of the Gran Teatre del Liceu, has participated in working groups, exhibitions, periodicals and other projects related to musical documentation. He is a member of the Spanish Association of Musical Documentation and, a member of the Official College of Bibliothecaris-Documentalists of Catalonia (COBDC). Since 2006 she is the head of the Music Section of the Library of Catalonia.