Salamanca city of culture and knowledge. And it is because of history, because of tradition, because it can afford to be so and to the extent of its possibilities it honors the title with which it is sold to the world as a slogan, because it is a container that has been cooking culture and culture for centuries. That leaves a mark that the passage of time cannot completely erase. He takes great care to ensure that this is the case and sometimes he achieves it with a certain grandeur. He does not miss an opportunity to do so, and he does not lack opportunities because his own history provides them to him. The last one, the Eighth Centennial of its University, an occasion that has given a lot of itself and although it is now behind it, has left a trail that if cultivated well can be long and lasting.

Salamanca is an inexhaustible vein of itself. He was aware of this, but ended up resting on his laurels. Now she has begun to wake up and organize herself, although without completely ending the love for the torpor that kept her for years and years living very comfortably off her income, which if not worked on becomes impoverished and depleted.
Navel gazing is a narcissistic reaction and narcissism is difficult to cure among those who see themselves and like themselves so much that they come to believe that there is nothing and no one in the world that can overshadow them. And with that belief they go through life so full of faith in themselves that it blinds them, until the harsh reality breaks their minds, suddenly restoring sight to those who one day lost it or giving it to those who never had it, but did not. like all of them, not even many, although enough to make things change. And in Salamanca things are changing, little by little, visibly and without pause.

In this last week Salamanca offered a cultural program of notable relevance in which two musical events of no little appeal stood out. One, the concert by the National Youth Orchestra of Spain at the Palacio de Congresos, which, directed by Bruno Aprea, performed the sixth symphony (“Pastoral”) by Beethoven and the first symphony (“Tintán”) by Mahler, two very demanding works of two composers very different from each other but not at all inclined to make the work easier for those who face their scores, this time with a memorable concert. It filled the Palace with a mostly young audience who enjoyed the good work of a well-conducted orchestra that was grateful for the success with the overture to “La gazza ladra” by Rossini and a pasodoble as the final point of the concert.

Another, the symphonic show that José Mercé put on stage accompanied by the City of Salamanca Youth Symphony Orchestra directed by Juan Paulo Gómez at the CAEM. A symphonic recital by a singer with an orchestra, a novelty (at least for me) of which the attractive thing was not Mercé, nor the orchestra, but seeing and hearing how they managed to make the musical invention sound good. And it sounded wonderful. The orchestra lived up to what was expected, it never disappoints; Mercé, his guitarist and his clappers, as always, and the ensemble, formidable, surrounded by jets of lights and impacts of surprising and spectacular images. He said goodbye to the respectable audience with a fandango, hand in hand with the guitarist, in a dry tone, which is how fandangos are really sung, which made the audience vibrate, finishing the show with a memory of Farina.

Beethoven, Mahler, Rossini and the farewell pasodoble, the young people of both orchestras and their conductors, Mercé, the guitarist, the clappers and the final fandango took the respectable out of the orbit through which current owners such as if there were no one or nothing but them and theirs tormenting their existence, because outside of politics there is also life.