Guillermo Rosabal-Coto Founder & Coordinator Guillermo Rosabal-Coto is a Professor of Music and Education and Researcher at Universidad de Costa Rica, and Visiting Scholar 2018 at the University of Toronto. His focus as arts education practitioner and social researcher traces back to a puzzle that emerged in his own teenage music student body: ‘Why does education force me to modify who I am in order to become worthy of certification and social legitimacy?’ Guillermo intends to challenge the historical and epistemological Eurocentric narratives of civilization/progress and development/democracy handed down through the national identity of postcolonial nations and their educational apparatus, that coordinate why and how we socialize around music. Rosabal-Coto has presented music- and education-related papers, and participated in panels in conferences on cultural history, ethnomusicology, music education, sociology, and narrative research, in Brazil, Canada, China, Costa Rica, England, Finland, Norway, and the United States of America. He often engages in videoconference or in-person conversation with teachers and students in countries like Argentina, Canada, Mexico, and Nicaragua to interrogate sociological problems in education and socialization in the arts. Guillermo served as arts and music education consultant to the Ministry of Public Education and the Ministry of Culture and Youth, in Costa Rica, as well as to international non-government organizations, such as UNDP, UNESCO, UNICEF, and the Organization of Iberian American States. As consultant, he designed the current primary and secondary school general music curricula for Costa Rica’s public education system, and provided teacher training sessions on a national scale for their implementation. Guillermo Rosabal-Coto holds a doctoral degree in Music (research programme) from Sibelius Academy-Uniarts Helsinki. He has authored book chapters and articles in English and Spanish. In 2017, he guest co-edited the first special issue in Spanish, on the decolonization of music education in Latin America, for Revista Internacional de Educación Musical. Upon invitation by Action, Criticism, and Theory for Music Education journal, he guest edits a forthcoming multilingual/multinational issue with a similar focus. Rosabal-Coto’s published work and projects can be found at: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Guillermo_Rosabal_Coto

Elsy Vargas Villalobos holds a Master’s degree in Communication Media Administration. She has broad experience in consultancy and audiovisual production for films, documentaries, as well as for institutional and corporate campaigns in the public and private sector. Her affinity with the Observatory of Musicking is more evident in her teaching style, focused on the contexts and backgrounds of people, especially in her project La Estación (“The Station”), at the School of Communication of the Faculty of Social Sciences at Universidad de Costa Rica.

A native of Venezuela, sociologist Attilio Lafontant graduated from Universidad Central de Venezuela in 2015. On the same year, Attilio became part of the Political Ecology Laboratory of this institute, where he has done research on eco-musicology, sociology of technology, and decolonial studies. Lafontant recently became member of the Venezuelan Musicological Society. He is currently a Master of Science candidate at Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas, while residing in residing in Buenos Aires (Argentina). His research addresses critical music eco-pedagogy from and for Latin America. His scholarly work can be accessed here.

A singer, teacher, and voice researcher, Argentinean Analía Capponi-Savolainen is a certified instructor of the European Suzuki Association. In this capacity, she often teaches voice courses at an international level, including Latin America. Analía is a doctoral candidate at Sibelius Academy/University of the Arts Helsinki (Finland). Her research focuses on the meanings of singing in the lives of diverse cultural background early school children in Finland. Capponi-Savolainen currently teaches voice to children, teenagers, and adults, in her private studio in Helsinki.

Electric engineer Teodoro Willink Castro conducts an unusual and innovative inter- and transdisciplinary approach in his teaching, as leader of ‘Electrizarte’, in the School of Engineering at Universidad de Costa Rica. This research group and performing ensemble is a laboratory for the creation of art through engineering, and exercise engineering through art.

A native of the city of Madero, state of Tamaulipas (Mexico), Etienne Daniel Fass Alonso has acquired considerable experience in preschool and elementary school music education. His main research interest, of an interdisciplinary focus (psychology, sociology, and philosophy), centers on the role of music education in public policy, in regard to the sociocultural challenges of the Mexican society in the 21st century. He currently presides the chapter of the Latin American Forum of Music Education (FLADEM) in Tamaulipas.

Born in Lima, Peru Matías began his musical education at Arte Para Crecer −a music school known for its innovative and value-center approach to music education− where he subsequently became a teacher. He then completed a bachelor in performance at the Rotterdam Conservatory World Music Academy. Upon returning to Peru, he became an instructor of drums and percussion at PUCP University in Lima. Since 2013, he lives in Toronto (Canada), where he completed an MA in Ethnomusicology. He is currently pursuing doctoral degree in music education at the University of Toronto.

A doctoral student at the School of Music in Universidad Federal de Minas Gerais (Brazil), Euridiana teaches piano to children and teenagers, and engages in active and dialogic assessment of musical perfomance, in addition to research on higher music education curricula. She belongs to the CNPq - APREMUS research team, which focuses on youth teaching and learning. She also performs with ensembles DuoAlismo (viola & piano) and Triptango (oboe, viola & piano).

John Paul Da Bosco is a versatile Costa Rican singer, composer, and producer, who combines his passion for composition and multi-instrumental performance, with teaching, with a particular interest in the needs of non-professional musicians. One of the first participants and assistants of what is now Observatory of Musicking, John Paul has researched and crafted his own project to teach children, teenagers, and adults to write and produce their own songs, using their emotional and literary background as primary tools. Da Bosco’s work as a producer has been acknowledged by the Association of Authors and Composers of Costa Rica (ACAM). John Paul is currently consolidating his personal project, as teacher at Hefei’s International School, in China.

Colombian percussionist, teacher, researcher, composer, and producer, specialist in popular musics. Senior student of the Licentiate in Popular Music at Universidad Nacional de La Plata (Argentina). Anyul has been part of educational and musical interchange projects between universities in Colombia and Argentina. She has also been an active performer in ensembles of music from Latin America, such as De la Tierrita, Ensamble de Música Popular de la Facultad de Bellas Artes de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Tropical Shake, and Quinteto Che Ovni (conducted by Tato Finnochi and Charo Bogarín). She wrote the music for the documentary 'Mestiza' and has volunteered for music projects at Universidad Nacional de La Plata. She founded and leads the educational project 'Tocá el Tambó'. Anyul resides in Costa Rica and works on her Licenciate thesis in popular music, titled 'Materials for the production and teaching of popular music from a decolonial, feminist perspective’.

Licenciate/Teacher in popular music from Universidad Nacional de La Plata (Argentina), and Bachelor in Spanish philology from Universidad de Costa Rica. Javier has taught Introduction to music language and Aesthetic foundations and production of texts at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Universidad Nacional de La Plata, as well as in its associated music school ‘Joaquín V. González’. As researcher, he presents and writes about Costa Rican music and popular music pedgogy. In Costa Rica and Argentina, he has been bassist, double bassist, guitarist, composer, arranger, conductor, and producer with jazz ensembles (Agustín Cáceres Sexteto, Vil Pullman), tango (Orquesta Típica Bien Frappé, Gisela Magri Grupo), Colombian music (De La Tierrita), ska and Balkan music (El Manijazo), Mexican music (Mariachi El Gigante), rock (Chancho e’ Monte, In Situ), folk (Natalio Sturla, Darío Acosta Teich), salsa (Tropical Shake), and Latin American song (Amanda Rodríguez, UNOS, Caravanas). He currently teaches at Escuela Integral de Música de Moravia and Centro Cultural San José, in Costa Rica.