School of Violeros (AC Muslyramus)

The School of Violeros (AC Muslyramus) is committed to research, preservation and dissemination of the rich cultural legacy of Iberian instrument building. It covers courses in the construction of period instruments (vihuela de mano, vihuela de arco, renaissance guitar, baroque guitar, Iberian lutes, Iberian harps, viola da gamba) and Spanish guitar. It has its headquarters in the city of Zaragoza, but develops activities throughout the nation and collaborates with museums and cultural institutions.
The project arose from different previous experiences developed in previous years in collaboration with important museums and cultural institutions (Ministry of Culture, Department of Culture of the Aragon Government and Sierra de Albaracín.) Among them, it is worth highlighting the “Musas, Música, Museos”, or “Joven Música Antigua”, with activities in the National Sculpture Museum, Lázaro Galdiano Museum, Sephardic Museum, Museum of Santa Cruz de Toledo, Museum of Fine Arts of Valencia, Museum of Zaragoza and Museum of the Transhumance of Guadalaviar.It develops complete training cycles of several years that allow students to become professional, but also includes medium or short courses aimed at specialization in some cases, and initiation, in others. It also programs monographic courses in different subjects related to instrument building: inlaying, surface treatment, restoration of musical instruments, making gut strings, etc.

It occupies a space not overseen by official education, which does not include these specialties and, since its inception, has received students from different countries interested in specialization in the period instrument building techniques.
The course contributes to the recovery of organological heritage through the application of a scientific method with a respectful treatment of the ancient artisan procedures and with the artistic personality of those delicate instruments. Te course uses research developed by musicologists, organologists and violeros, according to scientific methods, and is interested in the recovery of architectures, morphologies, ornamentations and historical materials with the utmost rigor.
From its beginning, in coherence with the approaches and philosophy of its main sponsor, the Daniel @ Nina Carasso Foundation, La Escuela de Violeros, also called La Escuela de Violería, is committed to the professional integration and cultural integration of groups at risk of exclusion and people with different disabilities. As fruit of this spirit, emerged such exciting projects as the “Ratatranta”, which was widely spread internationally, or the workshop for professionalization in the manufacture of gut strings.

The school was set up in 2014 thanks to the initiative of the Muslyramus Cultural Association and the initial support provided by the Daniel @ Nina Carasso Foundation, in a context, Aragón, in which instrument making was one of the major arts during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, hence its permanent commitment to achieve greater institutional support in the attempt to vindicate the importance of the legacy of the violeros of Zaragoza, a cultural asset of enormous importance that is internationally recognized.
Its structure also receives support from the Diputación Provincial de Zaragoza and establishes specific collaborations with the Zaragoza City Council and other institutions to manage projects of cultural revitalization and vindication.