During the presentation of the Habanera Competition at Fitur some months ago, Ruth Lorenzo promised that she would not only appear at the opening gala of the polyphony competition, but that she would also provide a surprise: a habanera of her own production.
Well, she did not disappoint as she sang it with the same feeling as any of those sailors who arrived at the salt bay down the ages.
The gala began with speeches by the guests and was immediately followed by the first of the choirs as the Municipal Theatre, home of the event for the third consecutive year, welcomed the Unión Musical Torrevejense. A historic reference in the city, the group performed the appropriate anthems of Spain, the Valencian Community and Torrevieja. Alberto Ballesta was the soloist who put lyrics to the local and regional anthems.
They were followed by another classic, the Symphony Choir. The voices from the Municipal Choral School performed five melodies: ‘Ubi caritas’, ‘Blanco velero’, ‘Mariposita de primavera’, ‘Rosita de un verde palmar’ and ‘La muerte del ángel’. With this simple and beautiful repertoire, they delighted, once again, the public at the Miguel Hernández square theatre, under the professional direction of Selena Cancino, head of the local choir since its foundation in 2002.
The competition continued on Monday with the grand choral exhibition gala dedicated to local groups, the Ricardo Lafuente orchestra, the José Hódar choral group, the Orfeón de Torrevieja, the Manuel Barberá group, the Maestro Casanovas choir and the Francisco Vallejos choir, which is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year. The competitive phase gets underway today, Tuesday, where Choirs from Europe, Asia and America are participating.
The mayor and president of the board of trustees announced, before Sunday’s gala, that the organization of the competition has overcome some last-minute problems with the displacements. Specifically, he said that one of the choirs that was going to participate, a male choir from Ukraine, will not participate because several of its members have been called up to serve in the military in the ongoing war they are having with Russia.
Dolón said that he hopes that this edition of the competition, the seventieth, will be the best in terms of quality in the last ten years and stressed that all the international choirs are aware of the idiosyncrasies of the competition and have chosen to perform habaneras that, in previous editions, have won prizes from the public.
The mayor of Torrevieja also wanted to pay special tribute to two recently deceased local composers: Mario Bustillo and Manuel Martínez Guirao. He announced that, for the next two editions, the obligatory compositions will be by these two masters of local music.
Regarding the return of the competition to the Eras de la Sal, the mayor said that the project for the rehabilitation and new auditorium has already been drawn up, that it will be presented shortly and that he is confident that the next edition of the habaneras will return to the venue by the sea that has hosted the competition for more than 50 years.
