The UV Philharmonic Orchestra opens the Serenates Festival with a performance dedicated to Sorolla
- UV General Foundation
- June 11th, 2024

The Philharmonic Orchestra of the Universitat de València will open the 37th edition of the Serenates Festival on 24 June. It is co-produced by the UV and the Cultural Institute of Valencia, and will run until 2 July with a programme that includes a dozen of concerts. The cloister of the La Nau Cultural Centre will once again be the venue for all the musical events.
Tickets for the all concerts will be on sale from 11 June at 12:00pm with a price of €4 and can be purchased online (www.latenda.es/entrades) or in-person at the La Nau Cultural Centre gift shop, except the concert of the UV Philharmonic Orchestra performance on 18 June at 10:00pm, in which tickets can be purchased online here https://palauvalencia.com/programacion-y-ventas/, and that of the Voces por Benin concert on 19 June at 12:00pm, which has free entry. Non-numbered seats.
The festival will open with the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Universitat de València and their new production Sorolla on 14 June at 10:00pm. The performance, conducted by Hilari Garcia Gázquez, will premiere a show consisting of a fusion of images inspired by the pictorial works created by Joaquín Sorolla for the Vision of Spain collection and commissioned by the Hispanic Society of New York in 1911. In addition, the music for the ballet Sorolla will be provided by the Valencian composer Juan J. Colomer, with a simultaneous live projection of scenes created and synchronised by students from the College of Art and Design of Valencia (EASD) for a workshop given by the visual artist Midiclorian.
The festival, consisting of a programme of 10 concerts, was inaugurated by Principal of the Universitat de València Maria Vicenta Mestre, Director General of the Cultural Institute of Valencia (IVC) Álvaro López-Jamar, Director of the Palau de la Música Vicente Llimerá and Vice-Principal for Culture of the UV Ester Alba on Tuesday at La Nau.
The Capella de Ministrers, directed by Carles Magraner, will be the next performers on Tuesday, 25 at 10:00pm. The performance Cants de la terra is the manifestation of the Valencian musical heritage from the cultural perspective of ancient and traditional music through popular songs, ballads, sung stories, folk dances and others that are part of recent history.
On Wednesday, 26 at 10:00pm, the festival will host Canciones para una urgencia from the 20th anniversary tour of one of the most important voices in Spain and Latin America of singer-songwriter Marwán. Marwán’s compilation album has a more modern and evolved sound to it, and will be presented in more than 60 performances in 10 different countries.
Among their predominantly female repertoire, the Serenates Festival will also welcome the participation of the Ensemble Gregal with the musical theatre El dietario de Matilde Salvador, on Thursday, 27 at 10:00pm. The performance is comprised of an actress, a soprano, a piano, a string trio and a dulzainas group (Spanish instrument) that pays tribute to the Valencian creator and was granted the 2024 Teatro en Valenciano Evarist Garcia Award of the Provincial Council of Alicante.
On Friday, 28 at 10:00pm, the Orquestra de València, one of the city’s most important orchestras, will perform this year an eminently romantic programme of French and Czech music, full of melody and orchestral colour, directed by José Fabra Català, and featuring the violin soloist Jacobo Christensen, as well as a selection of young musicians from the UV Philharmonic Orchestra. The programme will include works by Bizet, Dvorák and Gounod.
In contrast to the evenings, on Saturday, 29 at 12:00pm, the cloister of La Nau will be filled with ethnic music thanks to the Voces por Benin concert. The performance will offer a fusion of current themes with afrobeats, performed by 25 students from the music and dance school run by the Together for Life Foundation in Abomey-Calavi (Benin), as part of their latest sustainable and solidarity tour.
On the same day at 10:00pm, the Orfeó Universitari de València (University Choir of Valencia), directed by Francesc Valldecabres, will take the stage to perform If I am. In this performance, the Orfeó will present four works of choral music that create very different atmospheres and connections of the most recent times with If I am silent (2019) by the American composer David Lang, L’Stabat mater (1986) by the Norwegian Nystedt, Plainscapes (2002) by the Latvian Peteris Vasks, and the Concerto for marimba and choir (2010) by the American Gene Koshinski.
The sounds and rhythms of percussion will invade the university cloister on Sunday, 30 at 10:00pm thanks to the Alxarq Percussió group. Together with the percussion section of the UV Philharmonic, they will perform Drumming by Steve Reich for the group’s 10th anniversary. A major piece of modern minimalism from the 1970s, developed in four parts and with an interactive lightning system created and synchronised live by the Laboratorio de Luz (Light Laboratory) of the Universitat Politècnica de València.
On Monday, 1 July at 10:00pm, the Quintet Casulana, an initiative of women musicians that come from different professional backgrounds of Valencian music will take the stage. The name pays tribute to Maddalena Casulana, one of the first female composers to be published in the history of Western music. Together with clarinettist Daniel Labrada, they will perform American Rythms, a concert of American music featuring works by Arlene Sierra, Florence Price and John Musto.
The musical evenings in the cloister will come to an end with Tango: amor desconsolado on Tuesday, 2 July at 10:00pm. Directed by pianist Juan Esteban Cuacci and joined by singer Mariel Martínez, viola player Silvina Álvarez, double bass player Laura Asensio, and dancers Rebeca Núñez and Mariana Otero, who will take the audience on a poetic and romantic journey through the twisted path of love.
The programme of the 2024 Serenates Festival is made possible thanks to the co-production of the Universitat de València and the Cultural Institute of Valencia, with the support and collaboration of the Culture Department of the Provincial Council of Valencian, the Valencia City Council, the Palau de la Música de Valencia, the College of Art and Design of Valencia and the European Festival Association.
File in: Festival Serenates , Cultura , Música