The definitive refutation of that witty and handy but deeply cynical and ultimately inaccurate aphorism “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach” has come to us in John Beckwith’s new book, In Search of Alberto Guerrero. In this articulate, scrupulous, loving portrait of one who could, and did, and taught, and all not just well but extraordinarily well, and who passed on his skills to a surprising number of notable disciples, Beckwith sets out to collate and confirm all that is known about Guerrero, the charismatic yet mysterious musician who spent the first 32 years of his life in Chile and the last 41 in Canada, with almost no cross-pollination between the two parts. Myths arose about Guerrero, both in Chile and in Canada, but documentation remained sparse and his largest footprints tended to vanish.
He appears to have been an important composer of operettas or zarzuelas in his native country, and their productions and successes are reported...
Ken Winters has been a music critic since 1956. He was one of the founding triumvirate of editors of the Encyclopedia of Music in Canada.
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