Premiere of the musical Blood Wedding

Nora Fernandez Fernandez 

Next Friday, April 28, the URJC Orchestra and Choir will premiere Bodas de Sangre, by Federico García Lorca, in a musical format. The adaptation, composed by Miguel Tubía, is created on the original text of the work and aims to show an innovative vision of the Lorca universe.  

The concert is at the Tomás y Valiente Theater in Fuenlabrada, at 19:30 p.m., and is directed by Gemma Camps, director of the URJC Choir and Orchestra.  

As Camps herself comments, “this initiative arose when I met Miguel Tubía in a collaboration with RESAD (Royal Superior School of Dramatic Art). Last year, the orchestra played there and Miguel taught me his musical version of Bodas de Sangre. I liked it a lot and I thought it was a very good opportunity because it is a little different from the type of programming that the orchestras and choirs of Madrid usually do”.  

Since university, “it seems very important to me to spread the word about a work such as Bodas de Sangre, in addition to promoting playing and premiering music by Spanish and living composers. For this reason, both Miguel and I thought that it fit very well with our project and that it was an interesting challenge for everyone”, says the director of both formations. 

The musical work, created by the composer Miguel Tubía, has had to adapt somewhat to the format of the orchestra at the instrumentation level and also to the choir, although it has tried to be faithful to the idea of ​​Tubía and, of course, to Lorca's text. Given the premiere condition, Camps points out that "it is never easy to premiere a work, because directors like to have an idea of ​​what it has to be in their heads and this has not been the case." In addition, the director points out the pressure for everything to go well and "how difficult it is to take it to your land and make it yours." The good part, however, "is that you can work with the composer himself, something that we can't do with most of the works we play, and the great learning that we all take with us".  

Looking at the performance, Camps hopes to reflect "in the best possible way the idea that Miguel has, that the message he wants to give through music is understood and to communicate Lorca's words in the most exact way, which is not easy ”. In this sense, Camps points out that "working with Miguel has been a pleasure and it has been very easy to understand each other to try to make the best version possible".  

The reception of the event has been really good, almost filling the room several days after the premiere. Currently, there are some seats in the last rows of the theater that will almost certainly end up being occupied. Tickets for the concert can be obtained from the following link: Musical Blood Wedding  

In this regard, Camps has been pleasantly surprised, "since contemporary music does not always have the best reception, so I am very happy that people appreciate what we are doing and can see and listen to the work of Miguel Tubía that Personally, I think it's so worth it."  

The concert has the support of the Fuenlabrada City Council, which has ceded the theater, and with the participation of superior music entities such as the Escuela Creativa, Forum Musikae or the Escuela de Canto de Madrid. However, "most of the production has been prepared and organized by the university itself, specifically by the Office of the Vice-Rector for Campus Community, Culture and Sports, which is the umbrella under which the Orchestra and the Choir are", clarifies his director. The URJC Culture Unit, directed by Javier Otero, professor of Aesthetics and Theory of the Arts, has also been key in organizing and coordinating the concert. 

Lastly, the director wanted to highlight "the success of premiering a work like Bodas de Sangre in a musical version from an orchestra and an amateur choir, because these are the most difficult projects to do, but also the most rewarding". On behalf of the entire URJC Orchestra and Choir, Camps hopes "to convey the emotion with which the work has been written, both from the point of view of Lorca and Miguel Tubía". The objective, above all, "is to know how to convey emotion and enjoy", concludes Camps.