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Biography: Navarre and Pamplona
Pamplona and Sarasate, today
A stroll around the city today provides a faithful reflection of the origins of Pamplona’s most universal citizen, considered the best violinist of his time and the most performed Spanish composer outside of Spain of all time.
The Pamplona Music Conservatory, located in the Calle Aoiz, was originally called the “Conservatorio Navarro Pablo Sarasate”. Now, the musician is honoured through the “Conservatorio Profesional de Música Pablo Sarasate”, in the Calle Mayor.
The city also has a beautiful avenue, the Paseo de Sarasate, named in honour of the violinist; one of the most emblematic promenades in the city centre, in the Ensanche district, created in 1902.
The building marked number 19-21, on the Calle San Nicolás, now has a commemorative plaque, placed there in 1893 to commemorate the house where Sarasate was born. It reads: "here stood the house where PABLO SARASATE Y NAVASCUÉS was born on the 10th March 1844. On the 28th June 1890, Pamplona’s City Council decided to put up this commemorative plaque in honour of such an eminent artist, the pride of his hometown”.
Very close by, in the Plaza del Castillo, the Hotel La Perla has kept intact the room where the artist stayed every year for the Festival of San Fermín, where he would perform from the balcony to the delight of the crowds waiting below. In 2007, when this hotel was reopened, the city recreated this exciting event one rainy afternoon as the square was packed with people.
The Pablo Sarasate Museum is part of the Public Records Office (‘Archivo Municipal’, No. 11, C/ Mercado) and houses the legacy that the violinist bequeathed to the city of Pamplona.
Media Luna Park has been paying tribute to him since 1959 with an extraordinary monument located in one of the park's most beautiful corners. The plaque on the monument reads quite simply: “Pamplona to Sarasate”.
La Taconera Gardens also unveiled a monument to Sarasate, in July 1918.
After his death, the musician's mortal remains were brought back to Pamplona, where the funeral chapel was set up in the City Hall itself. He was finally laid to rest in a beautiful mausoleum in Pamplona's Berichitos cemetery.
My dear fellow countrymen know that I’ll never change; I’ll always love my country and my people, the people from Navarra…
