Your name and your face are known in Itsasun. Is it important to get involved in the activities of the municipality?

Yes, it is very important to me. I started as a young boy in the Ataitze dance group of Itsasu and also started playing music with the dance group and other musicians of Itsasu. At the age of 16, I entered the party committee, collaborated in the beginning, in the time of parties, in the accommodation and in other activities, and three years ago I began to worry about the world of music, programming, group management. Now I'm working very willingly on it, because I love music and because of that I look at the musical and showy groups around me to, after the village parties, make a programming that I like everybody.

What is your recipe for organizing nice parties?

It's not an ordinary law. But we adhere to some codes; on Saturdays there are always some concerts, we try to bring groups from here, from different musical styles, Basques. Sunday is a popular party, with a spectacular dance, with creation or with another group here and finally, we end up with a recital, a concert or a small dance. Finally, parties always end with a cyclone. Every day it has its characteristic and we try to maintain the Basque environment to make people walk here.

Are the people’s festivities important for the citizens?

It is difficult to respond on behalf of everyone, but yes, at least for young people they are very important. To start with the party committee we are working about forty young people, also in the gaztetxe, and the number of people who have gone through the committee always helps us in organizing the festivities. We get together young people from different backgrounds and we don't always have the same ideas; for example, I'm very involved in people's issues, in dance, etc., but there are also people who don't get too involved in these kinds of projects. This doesn't stop there from being places or times when people from different worlds can come across us to understand and do things together, even if they're different ideas. I take the music program and sometimes others bring ideas and set up the program together. For example, at this year's festivities we have a DJ on Tuesday because a committee that is studying in Tolosa has proposed to meet and bring a local DJ. We thought it was a good idea to propose something new and we have included it in our programme.

Then, all citizens leave during the holidays, not every day, each of them completes their program, but they all appear.

For 2019, you have prepared a special performance.

Yes, with Sunday's people's holidays, we've organized a horseback riding. A year and a half ago we started with this idea four young people from the dance group and we managed to carry the project forward.

The blind, the horseback riding, resurfaced in the 1990s. It was once organized a long time ago, but then it stayed for a hundred years. Since the 1990s, young people have reengaged and since then three have been organised in Itsasu. The last one happened seven years ago. Until now we were too young to move forward and we did not feel able to manage such a large project. Now, our relationships have been strengthened and the desire to re-move the group of dances has been awakened, on the one hand, and all in sight to resurrect the people, to rediscover the environment around the horseback.

That's when we begin to invent the dances and make programming among ourselves. As soon as the news broke out, the people responded with optimism, many people have come to us wanting to work. Then the repetitions, the plays have started; the songs have been written by a friend of the people, and the musicians who have participated in the creations are also from the people.

What are the ingredients needed to create a ride?

To carry a project of this kind, as there are many people, you need a fixed team that is working regularly. We are four in that management group and then we have put a responsibility on the citizens. For example, there is a music manager who is in charge of the work of the ten musicians. Together they write music, and then that person has come to us to ask what dance or what music we want to dance. It's the same for the theater, one of us takes care of a four-person theater group, and then we mention it together, theater, material, etc. As for dance, we have everything decided and invented the dances, we also give the courses and then the father, the otto and the relatives have taken over. In the horseback riding we have one hundred and thirty dancers and about thirty people in the theater. It does a lot of people and a lot of management, but people are there to help and we're in a very nice environment.

At first, the truth was that we had informed people of our intent to organize a ride, and some of them got a little scared because we were already young. The organizers of the previous cabalgata told us that it was a large number of works, that they had to be very organized and that they did not want to take care of it, because they thought it was too heavy in the previous edition. The truth is, at first it scared us. Then we talked a lot with the generation of our parents, who lived as dancers and who were really optimistic and motivated us. In the end, we decided to take strength among ourselves and carry out the horseback riding project. For me, one such thing could begin by having a strong relationship between us. Then we taught people that programming had already been done, and we also showed that, although young, we knew how to organize things, not only was it an intention in the air, but we realized that we had a lot of work at the economic and organizational level. In the end we have warned people that we were able to manage a project of this kind and then people have responded with motivation.

On the other hand, dance occupies a different space. To assemble a horseback riding it is necessary to create new dances, although in the group of Ataitze dances we offer traditional Basque dances, mutxikoak in a traditional way. For us, it is important to maintain the Basque tradition, therefore, with great desire, with the first steps, we attach the codes to offer the dances in a traditional way. Then fandango and arin-arin are creations, we have also molded the gabota but we try to keep it as the steps are.

Without a doubt, the greatest creation is the theater, the tufts, there we start from scratch. The objective is to comment on the stories of Itsasu, the facts that have happened, the things that are mentioned with some difficulty, that are shown in a way. Four people actors have written together, they have done a great job.

Musically, creations are also needed. New dances require new music. We've also tried to enrich traditional music.

For Kostum, finally, we have brought some novelties, demanding exterior clothing in other dance groups and reinvented the clothing of the Itsasu group.

Has being a musician added a job to you?

I play music usually and in the previous ride I dedicated myself to music in all my spectacularity. But this time, seeing the great work there is in the organization, I decided not to participate in the musical group and I did not participate in the creations. Those in the group have done so among them, I have been by my side but I have not participated.

My first horse riding in 2007, I did it at the age of ten as a violinist. That year, I started taking violin classes, and my teacher took me to play the horse, it was great. Maybe for the first time in that era the taste for music emerged in me, also for the involvement of Itsasun, and culturally it is true that I like to play traditional music, Basque music and above all dances. I think my professor brought me to that, taking me to play the violin to the ride when I was ten years old.

You also talk about music out of the sea.

Yes, I started a year ago at the company Zarena de Zarela. Musically, I get very rich with them. In the group, fifteen girls. In the field of music, they're all our creations. It is a nice and enriching project, especially for me. In fact, so far I had never composed it and I did not leave the realm of Basque music. Melodies aren't violently Euskaldunes, they don't have a special bell. We've created the music we wanted, according to the desires of the moment.

I very much wanted this project, so that everyone can contribute what they can to complement it with the contributions of others... It has been very enriching.

Is it important to take care of the immaterial heritage?

In both music and dance to my liking, it must be kept as it is tradition, respecting codes. On the other hand, there is also a need for innovation, which is what will create the tradition of tomorrow. We are moving forward in society, our ideas are moving forward, so retaining things is good but adding our things.

If we add, we do not break the tradition, but we shape it, it seems to me that it is necessary, even to advance and transmit things over time.

Would I say that young people are quite involved in popular culture?

I find that the youth of Itsasu has moved a lot with the horseback riding. To begin with, the young people in the dance group, the students, have found a great idea, despite being young, about fifteen, about sixteen years old, they have soon expressed their desire to participate. Young people over the age of twenty were not very motivated by violence at the beginning, but when it began to repeat itself and the people started to move, a dynamic has emerged and these young people have also seen that all the people could move, that relationships were created between the people. We know citizenship, but we don't have much force in the village; thanks to the horseback riding, relationships are created among all, young people move and old people even more. Today it is true that on many occasions it is heard that young people are not moving, that they are not involved in projects. We have shown blindness that many young people have moved and that we can move the people with our own capabilities.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What is your musical repertoire?

I play the violin; I studied at home, with a music teacher from here. It was clear from the beginning that I liked the mutxikos, the dances here and the songs here. I'm just settled in the Basque repertoire, I've never touched any classic, I've never approached that. On the other hand, I also play Irish music, traditional music from other countries. I like those music and I play to taste.

You have to know that in traditional music here before the violin was played regularly. The Mutxikos and all other jumps were touched with violin and ttunttun. So, even though we're few violinists, we really have our site and the way we play. Now they are the trikitilaris, trikitilaris, etc. Those who dominate Basque culture, but with the music of before and the sheet music of before, it's very sweet for violinists.

Do you cross the border often?

To be honest, I do not leave much of the north. I then worked with musicians from the south recently, specifically with Arkaitz Mine, who is especially dedicated to Basque music. I've had other occasions, but I'm not going too much.

He's been in Bordeaux for his studies. Was it a good experience?

I spent three years in Bordeaux studying. The truth is, it was hard for me to move away from here, to leave my bases. But to my liking, getting out of here is good for anyone, to see another environment, a way of living. As a result, I have been able to see that here we have really rich things, dance, music, ball, theatre and many other things that I have not seen because of the violence in Bordeaux. From there I have come here with more desire to do things, to generate dynamics, to carry projects; it has created more empathy for me to be here and do things here.

In Bordeaux, I also missed speaking in Basque, that language, that relationship that thanks to the Basque we have in everyday life. I also find that the song or music creates a vitality between us, that we have a personality when we start singing, when we talk about a singer or a music; in the small towns I find that everyone has their personality and their role. In big cities, I think you lose that personality. So I say we're not a great thing in this world, but we enter the village and we get into projects, we have a way of being, and that's right.

Are you working in Basque?

I am working as a nurse in Kanbo, we are very few Euskaldunes who work and many times I speak in Basque with older people. They also know French, but the Basque language is their mother tongue, and when they see me as Maiana, they immediately ask me if I am Basque. As a result, a special relationship is created between us, there is more talk about their difficulties, about the things they need and about the language they serve. The creation of this relationship in Basque at work is very enriching.

Any other project, any dream in the head?

The ideas are not missing, but I have no other fixed project for the moment. In music, I would love to work with an Irish group and work on different musical styles. But I don't look further, I have a lot of work at the moment. I am also very happy with all the projects that I have in my hands, I would never leave the music, I also love Zarena Zarelako. Those projects enrich me right now, and I'm very good at that, and then I'll be.

Do I want to answer a question that I have not asked so far?

We have not returned, everyone has said so.