Spanish composer Marisa Manchado dies in Urda train accident

The 2024 National Music Prize winner, whose opera La Regenta brought renewed recognition to her work, was also a leading advocate for women composers in Spain.

Spanish composer Marisa Manchado has died in the train accident that occurred near Urda, in the province of Toledo, on October 28. The Asociación Madrileña de Compositores (AMCC), of which she was a founding member and first president, confirmed her death. She was travelling to Seville to participate in an event organised by the University of Seville’s Faculty of Education.

Born in Madrid in 1956, Manchado received Spain’s National Music Prize for composition in 2024. The jury singled out La Regenta, her operatic adaptation of Leopoldo Alas “Clarín”’s novel, presented in 2023 in a joint production by the Teatro Real and Teatro Español. It praised the work’s integration of innovative musical styles and its contemporary perspective on its central female character.

A career spanning composition, research and advocacy

The award also recognised a catalogue of more than 150 works encompassing vocal, chamber and orchestral music, alongside her exploration of new formats and collaboration across artistic and academic disciplines.

Her other stage works included El cristal de agua fría, with a libretto by Rosa Montero, and Escenas de la vida cotidiana. Her interests extended to electroacoustic music, musicological research and teaching.

Manchado also helped advance feminist music scholarship in Spain. She edited the 1998 volume Música y mujeres, género y poder and worked to bring women composers’ contributions into wider public discussion. As AMCC’s first president, from 1998 to 2000, she helped establish the association and lay the foundations for its COMA contemporary music festival.