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A native of Costa Rica, Dr. Luis Víquez has enjoyed an internationally-acclaimed career both as a clarinetist and as an orchestral, opera and wind band conductor, having performed and conducted extensively throughout the United States and Costa Rica, as well as in Taiwan, Guatemala, England, Honduras, Colombia and Panama. Dr. Víquez joined the music faculty at USD in 2016 as the Director of Orchestras and Assistant Professor of Clarinet, where he also oversees the graduate program in orchestral conducting and conducts the annual fully-staged production of the University of South Dakota Opera. Recently, he won the 2019 President's Award for Research Creativity. In addition to his current duties at USD, he has also taught courses in orchestration, instrumental music literature, music theory, and served as the Associate Director of Bands for the 2016-17 academic year. Dr. Víquez is a demanded guest conductor, having conducted the Heredia Symphony Orchestra, the South Dakota Middle School All-State Orchestra, the Emporia Symphony Orchestra, the orchestras of the University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory of Music, the Guatemalan National Honor Wind Symphony, the Strings in Concert Festival in Rapid City, the Cartago Symphony Orchestra, the Midwest Chamber Ensemble of Kansas City, the Cartago National Symphonic Band, the Heredia Concert Band, the Truman State University Symphony Orchestra, and the National Symphonic Band of San Jose, Costa Rica. His opera conducting appearances include Menotti's "The Old Maid and the Thief" with the Truman Opera Theater (2013), Mozart's "Die Zauberflöte" (2015), and Britten's "The Turn of the Screw" (2016) with the UMKC Opera Theater, and Strauss' "Die Fledermaus" (2017), Menotti's "The Consul" (2018), and Massenet's "Cendrillon" (2019) with the University of South Dakota Opera. Dr. Víquez is a highly demanded clinician and adjudicator at the national and international level, presenting instrumental conducting workshops and clarinet masterclasses at the University of Iowa, the National Conservatory of Music of Honduras, the National University of Costa Rica, Emporia State University, Wayne State University, and the University of Costa Rica, where he recently served as a Visiting Professor of Chamber Music for the summer of 2019. Dr. Viquez is the former principal clarinetist of the Symphony Orchestra of Heredia-Costa Rica, having recorded in four of their awarded CD productions. He has performed as a soloist with the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra, the Heredia Symphony Orchestra, the Sioux City Municipal Band, the Truman State Symphony Orchestra, the Cartago National Concert Band, the San Jose Wind Ensemble, and the USD Chamber Orchestra and Symphonic Band. He was also a featured soloist at the Missouri MMEA Convention and a clinician for the 2013 MTNA National Conference. Dr. Víquez is the winner of the University of Costa Rica Honors Recital Competition in 2008 and 2009, the 2012 Missouri MMTA Graduate Woodwind Competition, the 2013 Truman Gold Medal Concerto Competition, the 2014 Robert Fountain Memorial Award and received the Outstanding Conductor Prize at the 2011 National Band Competition of Costa Rica, and the University of Costa Rica's College of Fine Arts and Letters Honorary Medal Award in 2009. In 2009, he was selected as the principal clarinetist of the Latin American Youth Wind Orchestra (Manizales, Colombia), and was one of the four Latin American musicians selected to perform in the 2011 World Youth Wind Orchestra (Chiayi City, Taiwan). Prior to coming to the United States, Luis Víquez served as an instrumental music teacher in Costa Rica at the Municipal Schools of Music of Cartago and Paraíso and performed as a clarinetist of the National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica and of the Cartago Municipal Symphony Orchestra. As a scholar, he has published near a dozen of academic articles - both in English and Spanish - regarding instrumental music rehearsal procedures, clarinet pedagogy, and Latin American symphonic repertoire in the Journal of the College Orchestra Directors Association, the WASBE World Magazine, the Revista Electronica "La Retreta", the Revista Educación de la Universidad de Costa Rica, and the Journal of the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles. He is one of the authors of the book "Benjamín Gutierrez: La Música es Mi Destino" (2016, University of Costa Rica Press) and recently released his first album as a conductor "Costa Rica desde Afuera" (2018, Musitica Records) recorded with the Heredia Symphony Orchestra in Costa Rica. Outside of USD, Dr Víquez serves as the Vice President of the College Orchestra Directors Association - North Central Division, and is an artistic advisor for multiple professional and academic artistic organizations in South America. Dr Víquez holds degrees from the University of Costa Rica (BM Clarinet Performance), Truman State University (MA Clarinet Performance - MA Wind Band Conducting), the Conservatory of Music and Dance at the University of Missouri-Kansas City (DMA in Orchestral and Opera Conducting); and has realized advanced studies in conducting at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, UK. He is a D'Addario Woodwinds clarinet performing artist.
Applied Clarinet, Symphony Orchestra, Opera, Conducting, Bands, Music Theory, Chamber Music.
Clarinet Pedagogy, Latin American Orchestral and Band repertoire, Opera Conducting, Conducting Pedagogy, Instrumental Ensembles Pedagogy.
