Libertador. Gustavo Dudamel

The film depicts the childhood of Simón Bolívar (Edgar Ramírez) and the moments that shaped his determination to defend the rights of indigenous peoples and slaves; his subsequent marriage to María Teresa Rodríguez del Toro (María Valverde) and the mark left by her premature death. It reveals his descent into a Europe in decline before he rediscovered his social conscience, returning to the Americas, where he began a series of complicated military campaigns associated with wars of independence.

Despite being best known as one of the world’s most dynamic and entertaining classical conductors, Gustavo Dudamel does actually have a background in composition, having initially studied at the Jacinto Lara Conservatory, before deciding to concentrate on conducting in his late teens. Dudamel was asked to write his very first film score after being inspired by the film’s subject matter and imagery, and impressing the director with some thematic ideas that he came up with on his own, which he demoed for the director on a piano. The opening cue, ¿Quien Puede Detener la Lluvia? (Who can stop the rain?), is an absolute knockout. Building from haunting, evocative notes from Pedro Eustache’s trilling ethnic flutes, the piece gradually grows into an expansive orchestral theme complete with a tribal drum section, heroic horns and, eventually, a majestic choral outburst that cannot fail to elicit goose bumps.