‘I will always sing, I will always sing, I don't see an end’ said Victoria de los Ángeles in a documentary made about her in 1992. And she added that she did not say this out of fear of death, but because singing was an inseparable part of her. Thus closed this year full of activities in which we have celebrated the centenary of her birth, on 1 November 1923 at the University of Barcelona. A year in which we have been able to get to know her and get to know her a little better, with activities that have ranged from opera to children's shows and from popular music to symphonic music. A year in which every day there has been at least one event in remembrance and homage to Victory. So, certainly, we can proudly say that, as she herself said, she has not stopped singing.

After several operatic galas, Lied evenings and concerts of Catalan song, this is certainly a very special programme. In 1964, under the direction of her friend, the violinist Yehudi Menuhin, she recorded the celestial piece Laudate dominum from Mozart's Vespres solemnes de confessor, a recording in which Mozart's music, already touched by divinity, takes on another dimension in Victoria's voice. The previous year her first son, Juan Enrique, had arrived, and in 1968 her second, Alejandro, was to follow. 

Fauré's Requiem is also one of Victoria's great creations, with the Pie Jesu with which she wanted to bid farewell to her own son. We wanted to end in this way, with this Requiem, which is not of death but of light, composed by Gabriel Fauré - whose death centenary is being celebrated - on the occasion of the death of his parents. Thus we celebrate with this Eternal Victory, the soprano, the woman, the daughter of the University's janitor, that simple girl and at the same time internationally renowned artist that Mimì always was, as she herself reminded us. The closing evening also included the world premiere of the Ave Maria composed by Joan Morera, nephew of Enric Morera.

There was no better way to do it than with two former scholarship holders of the Foundation, Irene Mas Salom and Josep Ramon Oliveras, with the Victoria de los Ángeles orchestra conducted by Pedro Pardo and the Noctes Cor de Cambra, conducted by another former scholarship holder, Maria Mauri. Thus, the voice of the Victoria continues to sound, alive, through these new generations of musicians. A programme that was performed on three occasions: in the Church of Santa Ana in Barcelona, the city where she was born (and which includes this recording), in the Monastery of Sant Cugat del Vallès, the city where she spent her last years, and at the official closing of the centenary in the Generalitat de Catalunya. Where lietà uscì al tuo grido d'amore.
 

Helena Mora, presidenta de la Fundación Victoria de los Ángeles
Marc Busquets, comisario del Centenario de Victoria de los Ángeles