Coming from Erronkari, a Basque valley in the Navarrese Pyrenees, where native Euskara was spoken, similar and relative to that spoken in nearby Zuberoa, and Navarrese Romance. Thus, Juli n grew up speaking Roncal Basque at home, in the street and in the mountains. Spanish romance at school. Later it will be n that this bilingualism, this constant mental gymnastics, would be favorable for him to master Spanish, Italian and French. His curiosity, his eagerness to know, made him visit International Exhibitions. In his continuous travel he came to visit the great European works of art, advised by his artist friends. Pilar Tuero-O'Donnell, in her work "Mariano Benlliure or Recuerdos de una familia", 1962, reveals Gayarre's charisma. "Years before Benlliure's wedding, Gayarre, upon his arrival in Rome, had the habit of granting his first visit to the studio that the sculptor owned on the Vía Margutta. From the garden, in a high-pitched tone he called: Mariano !... Upon hearing that exceptional voice, the artists who occupied the other studios, full of joy, went out to the windows exclaiming: Ecco, Gayarre!... Those visits did not stop after Mariano's wedding ". "Little Leopoldita was born"... "Nobody was more gently rocked than that little person. She climbed on the knees of that great friend, begging in her babbling that he would sing her favorite lullaby for her. Juli n Gayarre sang one of those habaneras then in vogue...". "That big man, like a good singer, held her close to him, and sweetly sang the long-awaited lullaby...". "That throat where the musical notes were silver laughter, seemed to impregnate a harmonious trace in the ni"... "Nini was always a lover of singing". "I would have wanted to be the famous treble that I dreamed of when I remembered that extraordinary being. When he was missing, the charm of that home also seemed to disappear." Gayarre's death was a terrible blow to Benlliure. Pilar Tuero continues: "When he died, he locked himself in his studio without wanting to see anyone. In this solitude he had to draw traits with which to perpetuate the memory of the great singer and great friend." Cultivating his spirit through constant travel, multiple relationships and faithful friendships, he did not neglect reading. I met the great Italian, French and Spanish authors and was able to read them in their respective languages. In his triumphs in Milan, he knew how to find time to visit the mausoleum of General Pedro de Bereterra, Count of Oliveto, better known as Pedro Navarro, originally from the Roncal valley. Without forgetting his friendships among teachers such as Donizetti, Ponchielli or Barbieri and the great Adelina Patti. His relationships and even friendship, with Castelar, the Benlliures or contacts with V ctor Hugo or the famous Sarah Bernard. But he did not forget his close friends, who appear in all his biographies as a constant in his life. And his special friends from the Basque Country, Joaqu n Maya, Hilari n Eslava, Conrado García, Pe ay Go i, Iparraguirre, Sagarminaga or the fleeting cantatas in pilgrimage as well as that of Urkiola, mixed among the waiters, when the rosquillera exclaimed hearing him sing: "You, theater, should do it." And all this, starting from his great heart, his clear mind and his miraculous throat. His culture should be studied from his charismatic figure, from his integral humanism.
MEL