What do you remember about that little girl who started singing and solfeo with Fitero's serora?

Friars and seroras were the only ones who could open the doors of music. Musical education was considered to be an essential part of general education. The Catholic Church kept alive the heartbeat of this wisdom, although when she went to study in Germany she realized that the Protestant Church was working for music much more than the Catholic Church. It was a very limited society. In a town like Fitero there was no way to get to know the opera, no one imagined what a singing career or a professional art career was. Because I wasn't at home, we were going to watch television in Grandma's house, but there were other activities to spend time. People were more open, I was going to sing, and in the background, there was a desire to share the moment. Now we want to be very individualistic, very selfish, but we've forgotten that singing is sharing, and every moment we're losing the benefits of the relationship. The decline in relations has led to a widespread loss of ethics, and there is no more to see how many scandals of corruption and money diversion are crumbling. With its benefits and damage, it was another society. I have always had the skills of singing, but at the age of 17, when I left to Pamplona to enroll in the conservatory, I also enrolled in the puericulture of the university clinic. So people considered it a musical complement, no one thought it was serious, more than a professional with an exotic touch. In the Spanish state, moreover, music had no professional output: there were no orchestras, there were no concert halls, there was no opera…

And there wasn't as much confusion and noise as there was today.

The worst thing is that we don't realize it. In other countries they are more aware, but when I am in Spain it is an afrus. You even talk higher, thinking you can't understand it without uploading the volume. We are not aware of the damage from noise pollution, we are not aware of what limits our attention, of what prevents us from reaching the small treasures of music. Pulling the thread, why is a minority the fondness for classical music? Because nobody drives it, because there is no news of classical music in the media, because in the music lines of the malls you hear the astonishment of the fashion group ... When is classical music? People must be educated, certain areas must be discovered, heads of eyes must be opened. If there was no one-quarter hour football space in the daily news, who would go to football? It is sad to leave musical and cultural education in the hands of the passionate local amateurs. A specific set of criteria linked to the political spirit should be rooted out, forgetting that the politician wants benefits in his term of office. It's not about putting the medals in your chest, it's about working for everybody's benefit. Politicians must be told that making a room available to culture is not a merit, but a duty. Don't we choose to generate well-being?

In the Spanish State, several theatres, auditoriums and concert halls were built a few years ago. Now three quarters are empty, waiting for the money to schedule anything.

This crisis has shown that brick is worth more than culture. Imagine, the passion for immediate benefit has led us to build airports that are not even used now. What was needed? Wasn't it better that instead of making two theaters, you just created one and you had coins to schedule? No one foresees anything. No one has lost a second to thinking about what could be programmed in the room he was going to build. The goal was not to program, but to do theater. But what is an empty theater good for? Create jobs in two or three years and send those people into unemployment? What will happen when there are no small dogs to pay unemployment benefits? If we all go to unemployment, there will be no unemployment. Where are we going with the austerity policies that they're pushing? At this point, it looks like we're going to be in the cave until things change, but things aren't going to fly by themselves. If you don't sow seeds, you're unlikely to receive harvest.

Can you get a proper harvest by working art and creativity in school?

Music is pure mathematics, feelings, sensitization, theater, plastic arts... It's not just what you like or not, it's what affects you. Music develops a personal education and, although it does not bring immediate benefits, it leaves very deep traces on us. It should be a compulsory lesson, but not only music, but also paintings, writing and everything related to art. The school works and strengthens the sensitivities that will later be echoed in society. Society has a square vision of the Conservatory, and it cannot be a prison, but a window to be able to squeeze out the gift of oneself. In Germany, I acquired the discipline that they have in DNA, and I think it's a perfect cocktail mixed with the initiative that we Latinos have. Without this discipline, the beautiful voice is useless, you're not going to move forward, but the discipline doesn't have to be Kafkaesque or wood-based.

What relationship do you have with your voice?

It continues, eternal, and sometimes terribly heavy. You're always controlling your whole body, taking care of your physique, because how your instrument works depends on your physical state. You have to be athletic, walk day by day, do certain gymnastic exercises, because our motor is the bellows and the diaphragm, and if we don't strengthen them, we can pott at any time. You can't get out of the juerga, you have to spend the very quiet day concert days not to tire your vocal cords, you have to put the machinery in motion every day doing vocalization and memorization exercises... Care demands extraordinary rigor. As if it were not enough, over time the voice changes, you are more disgusted than the mirror denouncing aging and, whether you like it or not, you just have to accept some limits. Well, there are singers who stretch on stage until they're 70, although they don't have the voice capacity they had at 40, but they've overcome the physical deficiencies with their musicality and sense of transmission. I have always been clear that I wanted to keep myself, and that is why I have made long productions. It was clear that, if I traveled two days, I would sing and leave immediately, I would not give up. Travel leaves me stunned, I have to sit where I am, be quiet, breathe the atmosphere, otherwise I cannot give a hundred percent. In my case, being in the same city for a long time has been a suggestion, but everyone has to figure out what suits them and what doesn't. Some will tell you that eating nuts is bad for your voice, that dairy products bring phlegm, but as you know the sensitivity each develops, you need to know what affects your lameness.

Does the voice lead you to play some characters and rule out others?

The voice is the guide of your trajectory, you can't force or manipulate. If you force him, he's free, sooner or later he's grimacing. What happens to athletes? They're in danger at the time they're forced. So first of all, I study whether the character adapts to my vocal capabilities, that don't move beyond my limits. Once this is proven, you must be clear that the music and composer are sacred, that behind each work there is an intention, and once the music is worked, I begin to add the text. I need to work a piece a year before the performance and let rest for a few months. It's amazing the path that the character makes, especially inside of you. Owning that evolution gives me great confidence. So I started rehearsing with a repeater. They are the keys of the opera, they control all the elements of the play, they have every character in the head and the text, the technique and the style are constantly oriented. These guidelines don't mean that you don't have to produce anything of yourself, but within those guidelines you have to move according to your artist status. That's the good of the artist. Don't forget that you're interpreting from the moment you sing, because representing is not moving your hands, but feeling this character in you. If you have an internalized character, you don't need a lot of adornment, you'll get dramatization, the theatrization itself.

Isn't the trend that puts the image above the voice prevailing?

Yes, they are changing priorities and values. I have worked with great stage directors, I have been part of the pioneers of staging, but I am convinced that an opera should not put the image above the voice. If singers don't feel the characters in the bowels, the most pompous scenes are useless. We have been forgotten that the success of opera lies in musical instruments, and that singers are essential, not stage directors. I do not agree to strengthen the scene to the detriment of the voice. I put the neck in which it is much better to give an opera in concert version in stylistic version from the root than to assemble splendid sceneries and treat awkward music. To do this, I'm going to see a groundbreaking piece, not an opera. Music is the complement of all the arts, and the roundness of the opera lies in the elaboration and expression of this complement. I'm not a soprano standing on stage, I love the scene, but we can't put aside the essence of opera.

Can critique and programmers leave you on the edge of the road?

Criticism has lost the rigour and honesty that characterizes it. Sometimes critics don't know about music, and although most move around the world of music, you can't compare the contribution that someone who knows about music can make to someone who doesn't even smell the technical reality. That's why critics lately talk a lot more about the theatrical facet. They talk to you about what they've felt, but immersed in that level of subjectivity, we should also value the mood of the critic. How else can we explain that four criticisms of the same work have nothing to do with each other? Thus, one must assess the criticism in its fair measure, read the eyelids without smoking, store what interests you and is already there. You don't have to divinize any critic, and fortunately or unfortunately, I guess they're valued and taken into account less than before. With the Internet, moreover, anyone can say whatever it is, at any time and in any way, and even if it's as honest as it's great to have their own opinion, the chair is something else. That's why I think programmer and artist agencies have a more oppressive power than criticism. Agents and friendly relations are interposed, and objective criteria do not always prevail in our market. Marketing has a lot to say, and more so in these times when artists are measured in the ability to fill the theater. I want to believe that the artist who's invited is because it's worth it, but sometimes I know that the best isn't where it should be.

The crisis makes forest laws even worse.

Because the first axes are often for culture, we're with far fewer projects. Most of the designed projects are not moving forward, and some of them do not pay it because the salaries promised to producers are still missing. There are not a few municipalities that do not pay, and there are many who get the money so quickly. Fortunately, I sing a lot outside, I come from Warsaw and I go to Bolivia, but the picture in Spain is very black.