Cor de Noies
Montserrat Meneses Sendrós
Conductor of the Cor de Noies
Born in Vendrell (1973), Montserrat Maneses Sendrós is a choir director and music educator. She studied at the Escola Municipal de Música Pau Casals in Vendrell and at the conservatories of Tarragona and Badalona. She trained as a choir director under the guidance of teachers Manel Cabero, Josep Prats, Josep Vila, Mireia Barrera, Pierre Cao, Laszlo Heltay, and Johan Duijck.
She has conducted various choirs throughout the country, including Joves Veus and the Orfeó del Vendrell, Coral Allegro and Coral Genciana in Barcelona, Coral Regina in Manlleu, and the Cor de Cambra of the Girona Provincial Government.
On the pedagogical side, she is a professor of choral singing at the EMMPAC in Vendrell, has been a professor of choral conducting at SCIC and FCEC, and an associate professor at the Rovira i Virgili University. She has taught courses and workshops on choral conducting and choral singing pedagogy throughout the region.
For ten years, she was the co-director of the Cantània program at the Auditori de Barcelona, and for the past fifteen years, she has been the co-director and artistic director of the Canta Gran program, a project co-produced by L'Auditori and the Barcelona City Council, which recently received the Anselm Clavé Award for the best social transformation project.
Currently, she directs the Cor Zóngora and the Cor Veus Blanques of the EMMPAC in Vendrell, both of which she founded, the Coral Cantiga in Barcelona, and serves as the associate director of the Orfeó Català.
Artistic team
Maria Mauri
Pianist of the Cor de Noies of Orfeó Català
Born in Vic (1991), Maria Mauri studied piano and conducting at the Catalonia College of Music (ESMUC). She rounded off her education with studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, where she completed a master's degree specialising in collaborative piano. She has studied with professors Vladislav Bronevetszky and Nelly Ben-Or (piano), Johan Duijck and Josep Vila i Casañas (choral conducting), Salvador Brotons (orchestral conducting), and Pamela Lidiard, Andrew West and Francisco Poyato (lied). Mauri has also studied singing, and one of her great passions is vocal music, which has led her to specialise in the vocal and choral repertoire.
She has accompanied a number of Catalan choirs: Cor Madrigal, conducted by Pere Lluís Biosca; the Cor Jove Nacional de Catalunya, with conductors Lluís Vilamajó, Mireia Barrera and Catherine Simonpietri; Cor Bruckner Barcelona, conducted by Júlia Sesé, and Capella Nacional de Catalunya, with musical direction by Lluís Vilamajó and Jordi Savall, among other ensembles. Mauri has also performed in lied and opera recitals with different singers, including Josep-Ramon Olivé, Enric Martinez-Castignani, Núria Vinyals and Kathryn Smith. She has performed at festivals and cinemas throughout Catalonia, as well as in England and France. She has worked at the Liceu Conservatory as a pianist for vocal repertoire.
She has been awarded numerous prizes and scholarships, including from the Fundació Victoria de los Ángeles, the Guildhall Scholarship Awards and the Anna Riera Scholarship, and was involved in recording the album Pau & Victòria.
She currently combines her work as a pianist at the Orfeó Català Cor de Noies, conducted by Buia Reixach, with her projects as a conductor, singer and teacher. Since 2019, Mauri has been a classical piano teacher at the Taller de Músics School for Higher Music Education, as well as head conductor for the chamber choirs Noctes and ARSinNOVA. On the other hand, she sings in several vocal ensembles, focusing mainly on ancient music and contemporary music, including collaborations with Companyia Musical and Marina Herlop.