A unique mix of talents, Grammy nominated cellist Aristides Rivas embodies a rich culture from South America combined with traditional western repertoire to delight audiences. The exquisite balance of sounds, storytelling, and flavors, invites you to a new experience of live concerts. Rivas’ multi-style career has brought him to share the stage with world renown artists in jazz and classical music alike, including Yo-Yo Ma, Gustavo Dudamel, jazz guitarist Julian Lage and living jazz legend Paquito D’Rivera. Rivas is also an active solo and chamber musician whose versatility in different music genres has brought him to some of the most prestigious international venues, including the Barbican, Carnegie Hall, Caramoor Music Festival, Tanglewood, Newport Jazz Festival, Montreal Jazz Festival, and North Sea Jazz Festivals, among others.
Rivas has appeared as a soloist with the Orchestra of Indian Hill, the Narragansett Bay Symphony, University of Caxias do Sul Symphony in Brazil, the Panama Youth Symphony Orchestra, and Baylor Symphony, among others. In 2017-18, he performed the complete works for cello and piano by Beethoven with pianist Spencer Myer. The following season, he released his album Laberintus, in collaboration with pianist Victor Cayres, featuring music for cello and piano written by Latin American composers, which is available in all streaming platforms. As an orchestral cellist, Rivas has been the principal cellist of many groups in the United States, including the Rhode Island Philharmonic, Boston Philharmonic, Dallas Chamber Symphony, and the A Far Cry Chamber Orchestra, among others.
Rivas has taught worldwide in a range of conservatories, universities, festivals, and youth orchestras, such as the New England Conservatory of Music, Skidmore College, and Stanford University in the US, Universidad Autónoma de Aguascalientes in Mexico, El Sistema Hanwha Youth Orchestra and Sejong Dream Tree Youth Orchestra in South Korea, the International Music Festival Presjovem in Spain, Vivace Vilnius International Music Festival in Lithuania and I Cordas POA festival in Brazil. Rivas founded the Rivas Cello Academy in 2020 and has offered 21 free online masterclasses since, with renowned guest teachers such as principal cellist of the Boston Symphony, Blaise Dejardin, Robert deMaine of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and soloist Johannes Moser, among many others. Rivas has also served as a faculty at Longy School of Music of Bard College, University of Massachusetts Lowell and the New England Conservatory Preparatory School. Currently, he serves as the cello faculty at California Baptist University.
As a public speaker, Rivas gave a TEDxTalk at the TEDxBeaconStreet, where he spoke about his own trajectory out of an impoverished slum in Venezuela. He is also a frequent guest presenter and lecturer at music education conferences, including the International Teaching Artist Conference (ITAC) at Carnegie Hall, the Orchestra of Dreams (El Sistema) Forum in South Korea, and the El Sistema USA Symposium, where he co-presented with renown author and teaching artists specialist Tricia Trunstall.
Some of Rivas’ mentors and teachers include Bernard Greenhouse, Lluis Claret, Larry Rachleff, Natalia Gutman, Natasha Brofsky, and Gary Hardie. Rivas received his bachelor’s degree from Baylor University and master’s degree from the New England Conservatory of Music. For more information, visit www.aristidesrivas.com