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Nora Fernandez Fernandez
Next Tuesday, December 20, the musical groups of the Rey Juan Carlos University will give a Christmas concert for the entire university community, in order to celebrate the arrival of these dates.
The event will take place in the Pontifical Basilica of San Francisco el Grande at 19:30 p.m. and admission is free until full capacity is reached.
This concert, which is one of the most important for the URJC choir and orchestra, "is a special concert because it is precisely where the most people go," says Gemma Camps, director of both groups.
His intention when preparing this year's performance has been “to try to make it not a typical Christmas concert, although there is always a part of Christmas carols, I wanted to mix styles and bring new things”, says Camps. "For this reason, for the choir I have chosen gospel music, with all the tradition that it carries, and which I find very interesting vocally, and the orchestra, for its part, will interpret various songs from Christmas movies and classics such as Danzón nº2 which, despite to get away from the Christmas theme, it has a very attractive Latin rhythm. In general, I have sought to make it interesting both for the musician who performs and for the audience who listens”.
For his part, the Academic Director of Culture of the URJC, Javier Otero, has pointed out "the final surprise" that they have prepared for the concert, and that is that this year the event will have the visit of the choir from the musical 'Los chicos del Coro ', under the direction of Rodrigo Álvarez. “Through the 25th anniversary Commission, we have carried out various activities with them and from Culture we believed that the best thing to do was to include them in this Christmas concert, to make it grow a little more and make it more attractive”, explains Otero.
As Gemma Camps has detailed us, “with the participation of the choir boys we will sing 3 songs from the musical. I think it is a very attractive genre and that it will bring music closer to the university community”. On the other hand, “having included the choir boys is one more motivation to attract people who are not so familiar with classical music”, Otero clarifies.
Due to the massive nature of the event, this year the location had to be moved, since the Basilica of San Miguel was too small. “In recent years we have already had capacity problems and, when the opportunity to do so presented itself in the Basilica of San Francisco el Grande, in the heart of Madrid, we took advantage of it,” says Otero. Choir and orchestra director Gemma Camps recalls how people were left outside last year and how surprised she was “when I turned to say hello after the performance and saw how many people there were”.
In addition to inviting the entire university community to attend the concert, Javier Otero has taken the opportunity to encourage "students and teachers to participate in the choir or orchestra in the upcoming workshops, although every time we open registrations the places fill up immediately ”. In this sense, Gemma Camps has stressed her intention "to make a more attractive project in which people want to get involved despite the difficult hours to rehearse."
The poster of the event has been designed by one of the components of the orchestral group, Barbara Africa, who plays the viola. The full program of the concert can be found here: URJC Christmas Concert.