URTEXT Digital Classics

Leadership

Meet the label’s directors: their careers and recordings.

Directors of URTEXT Digital Classics

Marisa Canales

Chief Executive Officer & Founder

Marisa Canales

50 works commissioned and premiered, nearly 30 of them dedicated to her

  • Latin GRAMMY nominationBest Classical Album, as producer
  • First prizesFlute and chamber music, Conservatoire de Versailles

She began her flute studies in Mexico before moving to Philadelphia to pursue her undergraduate degree at the Philadelphia College of Performing Arts (now the University of the Arts), studying under Adeline Tomasone, then principal flutist of the Opera Company of Philadelphia and member of the Philadelphia Orchestra. She graduated Magna Cum Laude.

Awarded a scholarship by the French government, she completed her graduate studies in France with Jean-Michel Varache at the Conservatoire de Versailles, winning first prizes in both flute and chamber music. She also participated in masterclasses with renowned masters including Jean-Pierre Rampal and Alain Marion.

She founded the Mexican record label Urtext Digital Classics, which she currently directs, bringing together distinguished performers and composers from the Mexican and international music scenes. Its catalog comprises nearly 300 titles distributed worldwide.

She received a Latin GRAMMY nomination for Best Classical Album as a music producer. Alongside her leadership of the label, she performs frequently as a soloist with Mexico’s foremost orchestras and presents chamber music programs throughout Mexico and abroad.

She has performed across Spain, Germany, France and the United States, appearing as soloist with Mexico’s National Symphony Orchestra, the Minería Symphony Orchestra, the Mexico City Philharmonic, the Xalapa and Michoacán Symphony Orchestras, the Sinfonietta de Paris and the London Symphony Orchestra—with whom she recorded the Concierto Caribeño written for her by Lalo Schifrin, who also conducted the recording.

Deeply committed to contemporary creation, she has commissioned and premiered around fifty works—nearly thirty of them dedicated to her—by composers such as Samuel Zyman, Eugenio Toussaint, Arturo Márquez, Manuel Enríquez, Gabriela Ortiz, Eduardo Angulo, Guillermo Diego, Julio César Oliva, Armando Luna, Leonardo Coral, Eduardo Gamboa, Lucía Álvarez and Alexis Aranda, as well as Lalo Schifrin, Ian Krouse and Andrés Posadas. She divides her time between Boston and Mexico City.

marisacanales.com ↗

Recordings by Marisa Canales

Full discography →
Benjamín Juárez Echenique

Director

Benjamín Juárez Echenique

Professor Emeritus of Fine Arts at Boston University and Corresponding Member of the Mexican Academy of History in the United States.

12 albums of Mexican sacred and symphonic music on Urtext Digital Classics

  • Latin GRAMMY nominationFor his recordings on Urtext
  • Shanghai PhilharmonicThe first Latin American conductor to lead it

An acclaimed scholar and conductor, he is Professor Emeritus at Boston University’s College of Fine Arts and Corresponding Member of the Mexican Academy of History in the United States. His dedication to Latin American culture is reflected in his service on the Executive Committee of Yale University’s Latin American Network for Interdisciplinary Gender Studies and the Council on Race, Equity and Inclusion at the Institute of Coaching (McLean Hospital, Harvard Medical School).

His expertise spans orchestral conducting, musicology, cultural leadership and Latin American studies. Having lectured across the Americas and Europe, he currently teaches at the University of Massachusetts Boston and Universidad Panamericana in Mexico. He trained at UNAM’s National School of Music, the California Institute of the Arts and European conservatories.

He previously served as Director of Music and Dance at UNAM, Director of Cultural Activities at Universidad Anáhuac Sur, Director General of Mexico’s National Center for the Arts (CENART) and Director of Outreach and Development at the Instituto Dr. Mora. His collaborations with the State of Mexico Symphony and the Mexico City Philharmonic underscore his artistic impact.

He became the first Latin American conductor to lead the Shanghai Philharmonic, and his guest appearances with orchestras worldwide have cemented his international reputation. His twelve albums of Mexican sacred and symphonic music released on Urtext Digital Classics have earned critical acclaim and a Latin GRAMMY nomination.

UMass Boston ↗

Recordings by Benjamín Juárez Echenique

Full discography →