A strong opponent of oppression in all its forms, Leonardo Balada met Martin Luther King in 1967. His Sinfonía en Negro is a powerful response to King’s subsequent murder as well as a description of the black people’s journey in the Americas from slavery to freedom. Both the Sinfonía and the virtuoso Double Concerto use Balada’s pioneering blend of ethnic music with avant-garde techniques, while Columbus: Images for Orchestra is a free adaptation of four contrasting scenes from his acclaimed opera Christopher Columbus (8.660237–38). In 2007 Leonardo Balada won an Award in Music from the American Academy of Arts and Letters which helped to make this recording possible.