San Fermín Festival

When he was 34, Sarasate’s relationship with Pamplona changed forever. From then on and until his death, he attended the San Fermín Festival held in his home town every year, strengthening the ties that bound him to the fellow citizens of Pamplona. The only year he missed this event was 1884, when he was forced to stay away by a cholera epidemic.

Certain documents from this period describe Sarasate’s arrival in the city; as his train pulled into the station, it would be met by hundreds of locals waiting to greet him, and on occasions, even members of the City Council joined in the celebration of his return. The violinist would climb into his carriage, escorted by children who would run alongside, shouting up to him, until he reached the Hotel La Perla, in the Plaza del Castillo, where he would stay throughout the Festival.

Sarasate got a great deal of pleasure from feeling like ‘the king’ of his home town, local god for a few days. He chose his own repertoire for the Festival, which he would perform at a concert held in the Gayarre Theatre.

Furthermore, when he arrived in the city, the musician would honour the people of Pamplona by performing a few pieces from the balcony of his hotel room, to the delight of the crowds gathered in the square below.

He participated in debates, informal meetings and gatherings with old friends, and in general got involved in the festivities, which made him a popular institution to locals and visitors alike, unconditional fans and critics. In 1900, Sarasate surprised everyone by leaving the city incognito during San Fermín, perhaps motivated by a comment made in a local newspaper, suggesting that the violinist “returns to Pamplona to boost his self-esteem”.

Throughout his life, Sarasate gave at least 93 concerts in Pamplona. Perhaps one of the most memorable was the concert he gave during the San Fermín Festival of 1882, when he performed alongside Julián Gayarre, a famous tenor from the nearby Roncal Valley, as well as other eminent musicians from Navarre, such as José Emilio Arrieta and his friend Ruperto Chapí. A constant feature of Sarasato’s work was the theme of Spanish folklore, often basing his music on traditional jotas navarras and zortzikos vascos and using these styles as the main rhythmic and melodic element in his pieces.

My dear fellow countrymen know that I’ll never change; I’ll always love my country and my people, the people from Navarra…

Complete biography of Pablo Sarasate