Torrevieja council has said that it will assume management of the Music Auditorium when it is handed back to the city by the Generalitat’s SPTCV (The Thematic Projects Society of the Valencian Community) in November 2021.
In assuming control it will be faced with running costs of 800,000 euros per year, including programming, from which it can expect to recover around 400,000.
The programming is currently handled by Sonora Producciones from Cartagena and they have done so with some success. With a capacity of 1,600 seats that have achieved an audience rate of over 60%, despite many difficulties such as the poor transport connection between Torrevieja and the Auditorium itself.
Sonora has also incorporated programming from the Torrevejense town hall itself such as carnivals and concerts by the Torrevieja Symphony Orchestra, with great public support.
As well as the 1600 seat theatre, the auditorium also houses a conservatory-campus for 220 students covering more than 3,000 m2, and that has never opened its doors
The idea came from the then mayor Pedro Hernández Mateo in the golden era of large projects even though there was never any clear forecast of how the infrastructure would be used. Mateo subsequently served three years in prison for corruption
It is now thought that the council might well revisit, along with the Department of Education, the possibility that the current municipal conservatory or a higher one could be located in the auditorium.
In his previous term as mayor Eduardo Dolón (PP) also raised the possibility of the building accommodating the headquarters of a private university.
