Biography
Dr. Ivan Valbuena is a versatile artist with an international career as orchestra performer, soloist and educator. Before joining the Atlanta Symphony for the 2024-2025 season, Ivan served as Assistant Principal Clarinet and E-Flat with the San Antonio Philharmonic Orchestra and has also served as Principal Clarinet with the New Mexico Philharmonic Orchestra and second clarinet with the Mid-Texas Symphony. He has also performed as guest clarinetist with the Houston Symphony Orchestra, Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, San Antonio Symphony Orchestra, San Antonio Opera, Austin Symphony Orchestra, Simon Bolivar Symphony Orchestra, Central Texas Philharmonic, Bogota Philharmonic Orchestra, among others.
He is the winner of the MaPhew Ruggiero International Clarinet Competition 2017 and the winner of the Harold Wright Clarinet Award organized by the Boston Woodwind Society in 2014, second prize of the National Performance Competition "Ciudad de Bogota" in 2011, first prize at the Bogota Chamber Music Competition in 2010, Young Performers Series of Luis Angel Arango Library in 2titi9, winner of the Bogota Philharmonic Soloists Competition in 2010, first prize in the Graduate Clarinetists Festival Competition in 2008, first prize at the Collegium Musicum Orchestra Soloist competition in 2002 and second prize in the ClariBogota Clarinet Festival Competition in 2010, among others.
Ivan has been featured as a soloist with the Symphony Pro Musica Orchestra of Boston in concerts in Hudson and Westborough, MA, starring the premier of Montilla’s Fantasia Concertante for two clarinets and Orchestra, a virtuosic piece dedicated to him and commissioned by the Symphony Pro Musica in 2015. He also performed as guest soloist with the Lab Symphony Orchestra, the Longy Chamber Orchestra, the Collegium Musicum Orchestra in the Colon Theater in Bogota and the Cundinamarca Symphony Band as guest soloist in the First International Clarinet Festival ClariBogota 2ti1ti. Ivan has also recorded music sessions for KUTX 89.9 Eklektikos Radio Show hosted by John Aielli.
As a member of the Orchestra of the Americas, Dr. Valbuena has performed in several venues in Europe, North and South America including the Krzyztof Penderecki European Center for Music in Poland, the Fine Arts Palace in Mexico and Teatro Municipal de las Condes in Santiago de Chile. He has served as principal clarinetist for six consecutive years and has performed starring roles including his performance of the challenging Variaciones Concertantes by Ginastera in the Nordic-Baltic tour in 2016. Ivan was also selected among hundreds of applicants from the American continent to be one of the eight leaders and pioneers of the Global Leaders Program to develop musical missions in Belize, Honduras, El Salvador, Panamá and United States.
Dr. Valbuena is co-founder of the "A Dos Music Project," a Latin American music clarinet duo that has been expanding the horizons of Latin sound by performing traditional music with non- conventional instrumentation and demanding arrangements. The ensemble is the winner of the NALAC National Association of Latino Arts and Culture Funds for the Arts 2023, as one of the most outstanding Latin American Artists in the country and the Presser Foundation Music Award 2017 for its educational tour made over 12 different Colombian cities, providing free concerts and lessons to hundreds of music students in the most isolated regions of Colombia, including population from indigenous communities of Brazil, Peru and Colombia as well as refugee camps in Sweden and Germany.
Ivan graduated of his Bachelor degree at the Conservatory of Music of the National University of Colombia and he also got his Masters of Music in Clarinet performance from Longy School of Music of Bard College in Boston, MA with Professor Jorge Montilla. He also obtained his Doctor of Musical Arts degree in clarinet performance with Professor Jonathan Gunn at the University of Texas at Austin where he was appointed as the Clarinet Assistant Instructor for three years.