Rafael Hernandez's Lost Masterpiece "Cofresí" Available Now

Miami, FL / June 19, 2013- The Classical album of the year! The legendary pirate Cofresi, immortalized by composer Rafael Hernandez in his operetta, is now sailing the music industry, with the international launch of Cofresí, a CD produced by peermusic and sponsored by the Universidad Interamericana of Puerto Rico. In it's first week of release it sold over 2,000 copies selling at Starbucks, U.S. National Parks and iTunes. This peermusic masterpiece is manufactured and distributed by Artistic Partners. The album, recorded at the Centro de Bellas Artes in San Juan, is the first commercial recording of the Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of Roselín Pabon. The tenor Rafael Davila plays the title role, accompanied by soprano Elaine Ortiz Arandes (Amparo), baritone Guido Lebron (The Governor), the mezzo Ilca Lopez (Gabriela), actor Gil Rene Rodriguez (El Dominicano) and a choir of 40 voices led by Dr. William Rivera. The CD features 18 tracks produced by Julio Bagué, Executive Director for peermusic and featuring the Grammy winning engineering team of Gerardo Lopez, Juan Cristobal Losada and Alfonso Ordoñez with mastering by renowned Classical engineer Michael Bishop and including sublime artwork by the master, Antonio Martorell based on his wonderful set designs. This CD is a result of an extensive reconstruction effort initiated by peermusic as a result of a dream that Universidad Interamericana President, Manuel J. Fernós, had of staging this lost work. Bagué secured the services of Pabon and Francisco Figueroa to orchestrate the work from bits and pieces. This two year process resulted in beautiful arias, duets, interludes, serenades, habaneras and couplets with lyrics adapted by Pablo Cabrera, from the original work of Gustavo Pales Matos. "There is no better example of the greatness of composer Rafael Hernandez than "Cofresi". It is the masterpiece of one of the icons of Latin music and all of us at peermusic are proud to be custodians of such an important work. We thank the Universidad Interamericana for their passion and commitment to Puerto Rican culture as this was a labor of love for us all", said Julio Bagué.Now available on iTunes!