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Gustavo Cortiñas

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Drummer / Composer / Educator

Embracing a multicultural language, while investing in a variety of disciplines within the music itself, composer, bandleader, drummer and lyricist Gustavo Cortiñas continues to surpass himself in the breadth of his work. “Cortiñas' music is uplifting, robust, melodic, and gets your body moving; it's an exciting blend of the artist's musical influences from jazz and Latin America, including his native Mexico" (DOWNBEAT). This can be heard on his four records as a leader, "Snapshot" (2013), "a Smörgåsbord of the moods and nuances that make up the human experience," (Jazziz); "ESSE" (2017) "a fascinating musical realization, exploration, and distillation of the works of Hegel, Aristotle, Descartes, Plato, and other brilliant minds" (AllAboutJazz); and “Desafío Candente” (2021), “a musical palimpsest that carries the weight of the history of colonialism and neocolonialism of the entire southern part of the Americas” (LatinJazzNet). On his latest release, “Kind Regards / Saludos Afectuosos”, Cortiñas gives life, through music, to words that attempt to build bridges and understanding in times of borders and ignorance; words that focus on our feet and the dust on which they walk, instead of the stars under which they dream.

A graduate of Loyola University New Orleans (BM Jazz, Minor in Philosophy), and Northwestern University (MM Jazz), Gustavo Cortiñas has developed a successful career in the US for over a decade, leading and accompanying ensembles in renowned stages and festivals in North America, Latin America, Asia, and Europe. During his time in Chicago, Gustavo has become one of the most sought out drummers, performing and recording with Javier Red’s Imagery Converter, Matt Peterson, Kitt Lyles, Erik Skov, Emily Kuhn, Michael Hudson-Casanova, Roy McGrath, Kyle Madsen, and the Carla Campopiano Trio, among other ensembles. Cortiñas is a member of the Chicago Jazz Composer's Collective, performing regularly for their monthly residency at Chicago's very own Green Mill. Gustavo Cortiñas is a proud endorser of Canopus Drums & Bosphorus Cymbals, and has been recipient of grants from the Mexican National Endowment of the Arts, the Illinois Arts Council, and the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. His album Desafío Candente, a sprawling meditation on Latin American life and struggles, earned a well-deserved spot in Jazziz Magazine’s list of the 2021’s Best Releases, and was listed among the Jazz Journalist’s Association Top Latin Jazz Albums of 2021, among other critical praise.

Born and raised in Mexico, son to a Uruguayan university professor and a Mexican elementary school teacher, Cortiñas grew up surrounded by books of all kinds, ranging from religion and philosophy, to history, economics and art. Music was just as diverse: be it through voice of Chavela Vargas, Wagner’s operas, the revolutionary cry of Rock en Español, or the soothing songs of Edith Piaf, music of all kinds was always there. At age 10, he fell in love with the drums, and was soon seduced by the syncopated and improvised beat of Jazz. This love inspired a journey far from home. First traveling to New Orleans, the birthplace of jazz, and later Chicago, the place he now calls home. This journey set the foundation for his work: Latin American folklore, classical music, and jazz; philosophy, religion and the Latin American cry for justice. These experiences and streams of inspiration forge the unique voice of an expansive artist who will continue to defy categorization in many years to come.

Emily Kuhn: Ghosts of Us

Read "Ghosts of Us" reviewed by Jerome Wilson

by Jerome Wilson
August 30, 2023

Emily Kuhn is a trumpet player from Chicago with a calm, lyrical tone whose music is influenced by the folk and classical worlds as well as jazz. That shows up strongly on the track “In Lieu of Certainty, Movement" here, where pianist Meghan Stagl keeps a rippling neo-classical melody going while Kuhn and guitarist Erik Skov solo in front of her with ever-increasing force and purpose. “When The World Is Young" begins with lovely drifting Spanish guitar from Skov before ...

Album Review

Matt Peterson: Better Worlds

Read "Better Worlds" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
July 1, 2023

Chicago pianist Matt Peterson is a versatile artist who defies genres. He is both an accomplished, bop-based improviser as well as a sensitive interpreter of the Western classical tradition. Both elements of his style come together on the exuberant and captivating Better Worlds, a collection of 10 of his originals as well as a unique arrangement of The Beatles' “Blackbird." One of the highlights of the uniformly superb album is “Petrichor," which opens with Peterson's smoldering chords that ...

Album Review

Javier Red: Life & Umbrella

Read "Life & Umbrella" reviewed by Mike Jurkovic

by Mike Jurkovic
May 29, 2023

The secret behind Life & Umbrella is that Chicago-based, Mexican-born pianist/composer Javier Red is a studied composer who puts a great deal of thought into the music he presents, both to his peers and to the world. But that music never feels calculated like an equation with an obvious answer. Just the exact opposite. So it is with wiry, creative glee that Red and his Imagery Converter--drummer Gustavo Cortiñas, bassist Ben Dillinger and saxophonist Jake Wark--double down on their bold ...

Album Review

Javier Red's Imagery Converter: Life & Umbrella

Read "Life & Umbrella" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
April 2, 2023

Chicago pianist Javier Red and his quartet, Imagery Converter, follow their stimulating debut Ephemeral Certainties (Delmark, 2019) with the equally superb Life & Umbrella. Red dedicates the current release to spreading love and understanding for individuals with autism. The dozen originals which comprise it do not have traditional starting and ending heads, as concepts flow from one to the other. This gives the album its uniqueness and contributes to its thematic unity. The angular “Brain Check" starts off ...

Album Review

Michael Hudson-Casanova: Animus

Read "Animus" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
March 14, 2023

On his second release as a leader, the captivating Animus, saxophonist Michael Hudson-Casanova leads his trio on a cohesive set of eight of his originals. The contemplative, moving music is complex and nuanced, inventive and accessible. Hudson-Casanova, who has already demonstrated his superb compositional skills on his debut, goes further on the current album, creating a unique blend of a haunting ambience and provocative substance. Guitarist Erik Skov begins the title track with reverberating vamps which bounce off ...

Album Review

Gustavo Cortinas: Kind Regards

Read "Kind Regards" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
October 20, 2022

Drummer Gustavo Cortinas' previous album was cinematic in scale, and he has followed it with the more intimate yet equally enchanting Kind Regards (Saludos Afectuosos). Leading a quintet of young, intrepid, Chicago musicians, Cortinas interpretes ten of his own songs that explore themes of social justice, love, and life in general. “When I Leave You" has an effervescent cadence. Vocalist and pianist Meghan Stagl endows the lyrics with nostalgia while her keys chime with melancholy. Trumpeter Emily Kuhn ...

Album Review

Amos Gillespie: Unstructured Time for Jazz Septet

Read "Unstructured Time for Jazz Septet" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci

by Richard J Salvucci
March 12, 2022

The premise of this interesting recording may well be summarized in the old Roman proverb, “Make haste, but slowly." Amos Gillespie is a Chicago-based composer and instrumentalist who has composed a nine-part jazz suite for a septet. In his own words, Unstructured Time is “about capturing childhood focus, creativity and peace through unstructured time." The title is a bit deceptive. While there may be a variety of meters that frame the improvised solos, the recording is in no way formless. ...

"Cortiñas is a highly musical and grooving drummer, as well as a laudable composer... his music is surprisingly danceable...groove-shifter, high-energy precision soloing, framed by vivid ideas. A joyful meeting of mind and spirit". MODERN DRUMMER “Cortiñas' music is uplifting, robust, melodic, and gets your body moving; it's an exciting blend of the artist's musical influences from jazz and Latin America, including his native Mexico.” DOWNBEAT MAGAZINE COULEURS JAZZ - FRANCE: "Esse is a masterstroke." Hraryr Attarian - Chicago Jazz Magazine: "With the cohesive and captivating Esse, Cortiñas has created superb work that balances refreshingly inventive ideas with high-caliber musicianship. This exquisite and continuously gripping record is a testament to Cortiñas’ triple threat of skills as dynamic performer, agile bandleader and brilliant composer." Dan Bilawski - AAJ: "A fascinating musical realization, exploration, and distillation of the works of Hegel, Aristotle, Descartes, Plato, and other brilliant minds...statements that are both studious and thought-provoking in nature...Gustavo Cortinas has worked everything out in his musical neck of the woods." Hobart Taylor - KUCI: "This is ensemble work at the highest level. The compositions are thoughtful, engaging, and heartfelt.The tunes sound super fresh, sui generis." Peter Margasak - Chicago Reader: "Patient attacks and painterly details, all articulated by his warm and generous band." Chris Spector - MIDWEST RECORD: "With the forward kind of thinking that tempts you to label him as Tito Puente III, you can dance, you can listen and you can enjoy this thoroughly throughout." Paul Abella, WDCB - Chicago: "This is a really wonderful disc, filled with some young heavy hitters from Chicago's jazz scene... Together, they make some magic on these heady compositions." Johnny Vidacovic: “Really slick. First class stuff. Great tunes. All the solos are easy smooth and not show off shit. Everybody is one for the music on this record. There is a tremendous amount of dedication and surrender to the music here as the band moves as one collective through the orchestral nature of this music… a very colorful and emotional musical trip... There is no one player that is better than another, they all together make the great musician who plays this music...”. Jeff-Dayton Johnson - AAJ: "With Snapshot, drummer Gustavo Cortiñas... a young artist seeks to craft a meaningful and representative musical statement and calling card. Snapshot is an understated and confident record... adventurous soloing and arrangements prevent things from growing dull... Cortiñas is restrained, marked by the same quiet self-assurance that imbues the record overall. He holds off from any extended soloing or overt displays of technical prowess for several tracks, preferring to lend a variety of rhythmic supports to the group performances. When he does step out front in the solo... he remains controlled and intelligent... the song and the sentiment it conveys suggest that the time is right for this solid and satisfying record." AAJ Download of the Day Editor's Comments: "Punchy, polished virtuosity from Gustavo Cortiñas and company. If this was a UK post bop band, it might consist of Clark Tracey/Nigel Hitchcock/Guy Barker." Victor Vieyra Santamaría - MIRADA SUR: "from Chicago came Gustavo Cortiñas' Quartet, with a swing that slid through the different emotional states that life has given him; this quartet and each of Gustavo's compositions are a musical voyage throughout different landscapes...and what can we say of young and talented master Gustavo, who despite the fact that he moved up north, he never lost track of the roots that bind him to Mexican Culture, quite the contrary, he has become a link between contrasting musical sceneries, without mentioning the fact that he is a genius of rhythm, and talented composer, basing his performance of this memorable night on his most recent discographic production: Snapshot". Jorge Ricardo - Reforma Mexico: "He named his debut album Snapshot: quintets, quartets, a trio and a solo performance that attempt to capture, like a "snapshot," the fleetingness of life...the result is one of those albums that you want to play back at the end of each piece...a music that is played, listened, and lived in community, that evokes collaboration, dialogue between parts, a constant push and pull, and a neverending array of possibilities that are consumed in the present through collective improvisation.". Cristina Zenteno - El Heraldo de Chiapas: "In front of a large audience, Gustavo Cortiñas' "Snapshot" performed yesterday by invitation of El Consejo Estatal para las Culturas y las Artes (Coneculta). Gustavo Cortiñas and his quartet, featuring Roy McGrath, Justin Copeland y Kitt Lyles chose to charm the stage of El Centro Cultural Ex-Convento de Santo Domingo with their sounds. The concert was little over an hour, and that was enough top send the audience home satisfied with the execution of "Snapshot," which was without a doubt a great performance of a kind and calibre that we scarcely get to witness in our state.

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Primary Instrument

Drums

Location

Chicago

Willing to teach

Advanced only

Credentials/Background

Master of Music in Jazz Studies - Northwestern University - 2013 Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies, Minor in Philosophy - Loyola University New Orleans, Magna Cum Laude, 2013 Combo instructor and guest artist at Northwestern University (Evanston, iL) Percussion/Drum set instructor at Flatts & Sharpe Music Academy (Chicago, IL) Part time Teaching at UCAN Academy (Chicago, IL) Supply teacher at the EDRON Academy, El Colegio británico during the school years of 2006-07 and 2007-08 teaching various subjects including music, mathematics, English, Spanish and history, and invigilating IGCSE and IB examinations. Drum instructor at EDRON Academy, El Colegio Británico through the academic years 2004-05, 2005-06, 2006-07 as head and founder of the Drum and Percussion Club. Private Drum Instructor since 2004 to present.