Marcos Castilla, the 'Lamine Yamal' of classical piano

Regina Sotorrío

Malaga

Friday, 19 July 2024, 16:14 | Updated 18:11h.

We meet at the Interactive Music Museum of Malaga (MIMMA) early in the morning. He confesses he didn’t sleep much the night before. Like almost all of Spain, he was celebrating the national team’s fourth European Championship win with friends, and then it was time to get up early to meet the press. But then Marcos Castilla adjusts the piano stool, positions his hands on the keys, closes his eyes for a moment to focus... and then the magic happens.

He goes from nought to a hundred in a flash. The young pianist plays Chopin’s Revolutionary Étude, with those fast rhythms right at the start that are so hypnotic for the listener. This is just the start of his rehearsal, the warm-up piece before tackling Ernesto Lecuona’s Malagueña that he glides through so naturally - astonishing really. Marcos Castilla makes the complex and dense seem easy and light. He is only 17 years old. He is Malaga’s ‘Lamine Yamal’ on the piano and, like the young footballer, he plays in the premier league of his own craft.

In three weeks’ time Marcos Castilla will be heading for the USA. The teenage musician has been accepted at the Bard College Conservatory of Music in New York, one of the most prestigious centres in the music world where he will study piano for the next five years. Only 15 per cent of those who apply actually get in. At this school he will learn from the masters, teachers such as Terrence Wilson who trained at The Juilliard School (under Kaplinsky) and has received several Grammy nominations as a composer. “He’s awesome, I’m really looking forward to working with him.”

He was also offered places at the Royal Academy of Music, the Guildhall School of Music and the Royal College of Music in London, the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and the Berklee College of Music in Boston. However, as happens in football, New York made the better offer. Bard College has awarded him a scholarship for the five years. Added to this are the funds he has obtained for the next academic year from Fundación Málaga (Becas Talento) and Antonio Banderas’s arts foundation, Fundación Teatral. This is the only way he can afford to pay for his studies as, with tuition fees and accommodation, they will cost around 100,000 dollars per year. He is aware of the responsibility that this support entails: “And I hope I can live up to it,” he says with maturity.

He is excited, eager to start this new chapter in his music career, but he cannot help feeling a little overcome by it all. “I’m a very family-oriented person. I like to be close to my loved ones. Moving six hours away, on the other side of the ocean, to a different continent, with a different culture, is overwhelming,” admits Marcos. He is the eldest of three siblings, the son of an English teacher and an industrial engineer.

Thus Marcos Castilla brings to a close his training in Malaga where, without yet even coming of age, he has won the applause of critics and the public alike. In 2022, he won the sixth edition of Tierra de Talento, the Saturday prime time talent show on Andalucía’s Canal Sur TV.

“It was an unforgettable experience. It was a turning point,” he says. It gave him the skills to face a live audience at the age of 15, but it also gave him a great showcase for his musical talent. From there he received a scholarship from Fundación Málaga and caught the attention of Arturo Díez Boscovich, conductor of the symphony orchestra at the Soho theatre. In 2023, he made his debut as a solo concert pianist on that theatre’s stage with Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major.

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This is the reward for all his hard work. “It’s a lot of hours, but it’s worth it,” he says, despite the plans he has given up and the absolute dedication required. It is not only he who has made sacrifices at an age when he is beginning to discover the world as an individual, but also his family.

“They are my support, without them I could not have done any of this,” he says. Marcos finished his Bachillerato at El Romeral school with “good marks”, while this year he completed his professional training at the Martín Tenllado Conservatory and perfected his technique at the Galamian International Academy, founded in Malaga by violinists Jesús Reina and Anna Nilsen. “I owe a great deal to all my teachers.”

And this is just the beginning. In the future, he dreams of performing in the great theatres of the world, from Carnegie Hall in New York to the Royal Albert Hall in London. Maybe one day he will showcase some of his own compositions that he is currently recording on his phone so as not to forget them. “I love to create and improvise.”

Let’s not forget that he is still a 17-year-old young man. He enjoys partying with his friends, “always sensibly”, and he is passionate about sport, especially football.

“It calms the mind. When asked about Lamine Yamal, with whom he now shares the same age, he does not hide his admiration for the star of the Euros.

“He has an extraordinary mental and physical maturity. He’s a guy who works hard and pushes hard, he’s got his head in the right place (...) He’s going to get to the top for sure.” The same could be said of this young pianist from Malaga.