The Smith Recital Hall echoed with melodies and harmonies as they gave a bittersweet performance honoring the memory of Johnny Lozano.
On Tuesday, Feb 26, the Memorial Concert for Lozano was presented by the Texan A&M University-Kingsville Opera and Musical Theater Workshop, TAMUK Chamber Singers and The Brother of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia.
Lozano played a pivotal role in the music department, and constantly offered unconditional support to the department and students.
An alumnus, Lozano was a retired teacher who taught at Memorial Middle School, Kleberg Elementary, and Ricardo ISD.
Aside from working within the school district, he was heavily involved with TAMUK’s music department for many years.
Lozano could often be found helping out students during rehearsal time, giving life/career advice or simple words of encouragement.
“Johnny Lozano was such an amazing person. He was always in the music building practicing, looking over his music or just socializing with the students. He would always have something positive to say and would help people with whatever they needed. When it comes to the fraternity, he would show up and help us with any music we needed to help us grow as musicians. Even when we would go out to do our Mills Music Missions, he would always be there to play piano for us. Truly a manly musician and a musicianly man,” said Ramon Garcia, The Brothers of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia director.
The Music Department gave a moving performance, as each song performed was originally performed accompanied by Lozano.
The concert had a lot of energy being translated in their performance that triggered a range of emotions with the audience.
Performers had the audience giggling in their seats through a charismatic and theatrical performance involving a wedding and men in dresses. Then had the audience rolling tears by the last song, Atencion/Alabanza.
“We chose all sorts of different music—funny, sweet, poignant to reflect our feelings about him. He was an impeccable musician and he loved everything we had performed over the past few years. I tried to pick a highlight from each show he did with us. Probably at the end of the day the most meaningful piece was Atencion/Alabanza from In the Heights. That was on the very first concert we ever performed with him. The text addresses the death of a loved one, and the music builds from one soloist to, in our case, almost 70 singers lifting up the departed person. It was a beautiful and cathartic way to end the concert. More than once in rehearsal we had tears, but they were good tears – tears of people working through emotions, acknowledging pain and moving forward,” said Dr. Melinda Brou, TAMUK Opera and Musical Theater Workshop director.
The Memorial Concert for Johnny Lozano offered closure to many students who were unable to attend his funeral as they gave their final goodbyes by performing some of Lozano’s favorite songs.
“The event was meaningful because of how many people came together to remember my friend Johnny Lozano. For me, it gave me some much-needed closure. I had a hard time coming to terms with Johnny’s death, and coming back to sing music he loved, for him, it just gave me what I needed to move on. Johnny was my best friend for four years.
“We worked outside of school together at a church in town, we were fraternity brothers. He impacted my life as a performer by rehearsing with me anytime or day I needed to. He really believed in me no matter how good or bad I really was.
“As a person, he just taught me all he knew about life. He was full of knowledge and was always willing to meet with someone just to listen to them talk,” said Oscar Lara, music performance major.
The passing of Lozano impacted the lives of many individuals at TAMUK, and hosting a concert in his honor helped everyone come together through the loss by putting something beautiful in his memory.