Lara Diloy, the baton of new times

Instruments were raffled off to newcomers and there were hardly any left. Lara Diloy (Madrid, 1986), at the age of seven, was given a french horn and, if today she is celebrated as a horn player, it will be said that it was a blessed coincidence. But there are suspicions that she would have prospered regardless of the instrument. Because she had previously been given a Casio keyboard, and the tadpole could play songs by ear. That’s why her parents took her to the Manuel de Falla Conservatory in Alcorcón, in search of an extracurricular programme to suit the little girl’s tastes. Without much ambition or background: her father, now retired, was a primary school teacher and her mother works in the city council. But the daughter, from that day onwards, has been working her way to the top.

At the age of 16, she had already started her higher education and still had one year to go when she began to think about becoming an orchestra conductor. “In an ensemble, you depend on others. As a conductor you are a transmitter and promoter”. Lara is such an exception that last year she joined the exclusive group of women who have conducted a lyric performance at the Teatro de la Zarzuela, like María Rodrigo (1915), Montserrat Font (2008) or Yi-Chen Lin (2014). On 12 May 2022 he took musical command of Alcalá’s Don Gil, because the titular conductor, Lucas Macías, was unable to attend. Another coincidence? No, talent that thrives.

He began this season 22-23 conducting the Orquesta Sinfónica del Principado de Asturias, and today, this Tuesday, he returns to the Teatro de la Zarzuela with the Orquesta Sinfónica de la Comunidad de Madrid. Everyone who comes is going to enjoy it,” guarantees Lara, who offers Falla’s El sombrero de tres picos as the attraction of a concert on the eve of 8-M. “In Spain, the incorporation of women into the Spanish cultural life has been a major challenge for women. “In Spain, the incorporation of women is going faster”, she celebrates, alluding to the almost 50% of women in orchestras.

This Madrid-born woman never felt “belittled for being a woman or that it was a barrier”, and sums up: “There are no more difficulties in my profession than there really are in society, which there are”.

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