“Home Without Maps”

“Home Without Maps” is more than the title of a concert—it’s a metaphor for what music truly means: a home without borders or coordinates, a place you can always return to, even when life takes you far from your homeland.

This concert is an emotional journey where songs act as compasses, guiding the audience through stories of nostalgia, roots, and hope. “Home Without Maps” speaks to everyone who has ever felt that home is not a place, but an emotion, a memory, or a song.

Juan Carlos Ruiz

Juan Carlos Ruiz is a Venezuelan artist, economist, entrepreneur, and TEDx Speaker. He holds a Master of Science in Operation Research and a Master of Business Administration. Since 2016, he has resided in Boston, Massachusetts, where he has performed concerts in several cities across the U.S. and abroad.

Ruiz won the Global Music Award twice in 2022 and was a semifinalist at “Premios de la Música Independiente of Spain.” He is an associated member of The Latin Recording Academy® and The American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers.

As a former member of the Rumbarroco Ensemble of Boston, Ruiz has been an invited music instructor and performer with various institutions, including ArCoNet (The Arts & Community Network) in Montgomeryville, Pennsylvania. He has also performed for Eddy Marcano, the Lorcas Music Society by Belmary Lorcas, The Winiker Jazz Trio, Zaira Meneses, Berklee College of Music in Boston, ArtBeat 2019 (Somerville’s largest cultural festival), the Dalí Quartet International Music Festival (2017 and 2018), the Latin Music Festival at Berklee College of Music (2019), and Semana Coral Internacional De Alava in Spain (2000).

Ruiz began his musical studies in Venezuela at the age of eight, playing the Cuatro, or Venezuelan guitar, and as a violist, in which he was one of the founding musicians of his town’s El Sistema youth symphony orchestra division.

In addition to his music career, Ruiz is a sought-after speaker. In 2018, he was invited to speak for a nonprofit organization at Boston University called Plan País, which provides educational experiences to young Venezuelans studying abroad. More recently, Ruiz was invited to speak at the INCAE Business School in Costa Rica and Universidad Latina de Costa Rica.

Ruiz is a music teacher in various Boston-area music programs, and an active board member for multiple Bostonian and Philadelphian non-for-profit organizations. He is passionate about connecting with every individual by expanding their awareness of culture and society. Furthermore, during his career as an economist, he has been driven by the power of innovation for every organization. As a musician, he strongly believes in the value and power of art for humanity. His most recent accomplishment has been the release of the Venezuelan Songbook, the first album of its kind in English, for which he obtained a Global Music Award in 2022.

@vozjuancarlos