Vijay Gupta—“Todo Cambia” featuring La Marisoul: “The Four Seasons” Reimagined
Created through a years-long collaboration between visionary violinist and author Vijay Gupta, Street Symphony, Los Angeles-based Mexican folk musicians Son California, and Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter, and actress La Marisoul, this evening brings together selections from Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons and Mexico’s traditional son jarocho music—including pieces such as La Caña and La Carretera—in newly created orchestrations. Rather than presenting these two classical music traditions side by side, the program interweaves them, allowing them to illuminate each other in real time to celebrate both the natural world and our human experience within it.
“In Vivaldi’s work, the violin traces the physical realities of heat, cold, wind, and storm, alongside scenes of labor, celebration, and rest drawn from everyday life. In son jarocho, songs like La Caña carry histories of land, labor, and endurance, shaped through generations of communal music-making. Both traditions engage directly with the natural world and with the human experience within it.
By bringing these forms together, the program does not seek contrast but recognition. The repetition and variation of son jarocho, and the cyclical structures embedded in Vivaldi’s music, reveal a shared sense of time as something lived—through work, through environment, and through one another.
This performance invites audiences to hear these connections as they unfold, not as an abstract idea, but as a lived encounter with sound, place, and the forces that shape both.”
— Vijay Gupta
Patricia Reser Center for the Arts
Thursday, 4/8 • 7:30 pm
Program
Click on any piece of music below to learn more about it.
- VIVALDI “The Four Seasons”
- Traditional Son Jarocho Selections
Artists
-
Vijay Gupta
Violin
-
Vijay Gupta is a violinist, speaker and citizen-artist dedicated to creating spaces of wholeness through music. Vijay’s work embodies his belief that the work of artists and citizens is one: to make a sadhana – a daily practice – of the world we envision. Hailed by The New Yorker as a “visionary violinist…one of the most radical thinkers in the unradical world of American classical music,” Vijay leads a protean career as a thought leader, performer, collaborator and communicator.
Vijay is the founder and Artistic Director of Street Symphony, a community of musicians creating spaces of connection for people in reentry from homelessness, addiction and incarceration in Los Angeles. Vijay is also a co-founder of the Skid Row Arts Alliance, a consortium dedicated to creating art for – and with – the largest homeless community in America. For his work in “bringing beauty, respite, and purpose to those all too often ignored by society”, Vijay was the recipient of a 2018 MacArthur Fellowship.
A riveting speaker, Vijay has shared his work with dozens of corporations, campuses, conferences and communities across America over the past 10 years, including The Richmond Forum, The Aspen Institute, Hallmark, Accenture, Mayo Clinic, US Psychiatric Congress, American Planning Association, and the League of American Orchestras, just to name a few. Vijay delivered the 33rd annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy for Americans for the Arts and his 2010 TED Talk, “Music is Medicine, Music is Sanity”, has garnered millions of views.
Vijay has performed as an international recitalist, soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral musician for over 20 years, playing his solo debut with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Zubin Mehta. Vijay was a member of the first violin section of the Los Angeles Philharmonic for 12 years, and has collaborated with the Kronos Quartet, the Philharmonia Orchestra of London, Yo-Yo Ma, and appears regularly with the Strings Festival in Steamboat Springs, Colorado.
A dynamic recording artist, Vijay recently released Breathe, an album of the piano chamber music of Reena Esmail, under his own label. His solo violin album When the Violin, a solo violin album featuring the music of Esmail, J. S. Bach, and Esa-Pekka Salonen will be available on Bandcamp in June 2021. Vijay currently serves as the Senior Artistic and Programs Advisor for Young Musicians Foundation. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Marist College, and a Master’s in Music from the Yale School of Music. His principal teachers have included Ani Kavafian and Glenn Dicterow. Vijay plays a 2010 violin made by Los Angeles-based luthier Eric Benning, and can be found on Instagram @guptaviolin.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
- Vijay Gupta—“Todo Cambia” featuring La Marisoul: “The Four Seasons” Reimagined (currently selected)
-
Marisol “La Marisoul” Hernandez
Lead Vocals
-
La Marisoul was born Eva Marisol Hernandez in DTLA (downtown LA), the diverse and vibrant heart of Los Angeles. Her first introduction to music was by way of her mother’s singing and her father’s love of music. At an early age, she began to interpret various musical styles, ranging from traditional Mexican songs, romantic boleros, jazz classics and rock. Growing up part-time in Mexico and the United States created the duality of American pop culture and the roots of traditional folkloric music, which helped shaped her musical sensibility.
“That’s the root of what I sing—traditional boleros and rancheras I learned from the musicians that played at restaurants on Olvera Street. They taught me how to sing loud and pass the basket around.”
Inspired by life, love, heartbreak and the drunken rants of the neighborhood, La Marisoul began writing songs incorporating those anecdotes with her own personal experiences, fears, dreams and desires. The songs explore humanity and society, utilizing lyrics that encourage us to get off the hamster wheel to which we are conditioned, while others inspire to spread our wings and find our own destiny. La Marisoul’s lyrics stem from observations, aspirations as well as, the agony and pleasures of love.
“I’ve gone through my dark phases where everything was sadness and heartbreak. I grew up and accepted me. You can’t dwell on negative things. You must move forward and look at the beauty of life. When you surround yourself with positive people, it’s going to affect you. We inspire each other to grow and believe in this dream that’s a little crazy at times.”
In 2007, La Marisoul became the lead singer for the group; La Santa Cecilia (named after the Patron Saint of musicians). La Santa Cecilia have performed at just about every type of venue from rock clubs to festivals in the US and Mexico, including Walt Disney Hall and the Hollywood Bowl in LA.
In 2014 La Santa Cecilia won the Grammy for Best Latin Rock Album for their album Treinta Dias (Universal Music). In 2017 they were nominated in the same category for their album Buenaventura (Universal Music) and in 2018 for Amar Y Vivir (Universal Music). With 6 albums under their belt, La Santa Cecilia are currently at work on their 7th album, to be released this year (2019).
La Marisoul also performs solo. She was a special guest with Elvis Costello and The Roots on their Wise up Ghost album (2013) and had the chance to perform with them on the Jimmy Fallon Show which was an exceptional honor for her.
In 2018 she was a part of the ‘Joni Mitchell Tribute’ at the Hollywood Bowl alongside other performers such as; Diana Krall, Norah Jones, Graham Nash, Chaka Khan, Los Lobos and Seal.
La Marisoul has made acting appearances in; The Bridge (2013), Artbound Presents: Studio A (2013) and Mavericks (2015). She was also featured as a guest performer on Pepe Aguilar’s MTV Unplugged, which turned out to be the first Unplugged by a Ranchero artist.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
- Vijay Gupta—“Todo Cambia” featuring La Marisoul: “The Four Seasons” Reimagined (currently selected)