Benidorm honors Jaume Antón, Rafael Doménech, and José Antonio Añón for their contribution to music and youth associations

Benidorm City Council will pay tribute to the musician and composer Rafael Doménech Pardo and, posthumously, to Jaume Antón Grau and José Antonio Añón Ramón, by naming three public spaces in the city after them in recognition of their contribution to and promotion of music and youth associations in the town.

This was agreed upon this Monday by the Board of Spokespersons, who, at the proposal of Mayor Toni Pérez, endorsed these recognitions, which will be submitted for ratification at the next ordinary plenary session of the Municipal Corporation and, subsequently, will be made official in separate public ceremonies.

Thus, it was agreed that a street in the city will henceforth be named ‘Jaume Antón Grau Street’, in recognition of his work during the twenty years he presided over the Unión Musical (Musical Union) and his promotion of music, local culture, and the musical education of many Benidorm residents. Likewise, it has been agreed that the current auditorium of the Benidorm Cultural Centre will henceforth be called ‘Rafael Doménech Pardo Auditorium’, in homage to the man who for 30 years was director of the Benidorm Musical Union and is the author of compositions as popular as the pasodoble ‘Fiesta en Benidorm’, the Official Anthem of the Festes Majors Patronals.

And finally, that the hostel and campsite at Parc de la Séquia Mare be named ‘José Antonio Añón Youth Hostel’ in posthumous tribute to one of the founders of the Horizontes Scout Group of Benidorm, who was its first group leader for twenty years, from its founding in 1978 until he died in 1998.

The Mayor of Benidorm, Toni Pérez, conveyed the congratulations of the people of Benidorm to Rafael Doménech and to the families of Jaume Antón and José Antonio Añón, whom he described as “three fundamental figures in the recent history of our municipality, who stood out especially in the fields of music and the promotion of youth and children, where they contributed immensely to the people of Benidorm and where, moreover, they instilled their passion in dozens of generations of Benidorm residents.”

Jaume Antón Grau

Jaume Antón Grau (23 de mayo de 1944 / 4 de febrero de 2023) accedió a la presidencia de la Unión Musical de Benidorm el 14 de febrero de 1984, un año después de haber entrado como socio de la entidad, avalado por José Pérez Barceló.

Junto a ellos, personas importantes para Benidorm también se implicaron en la junta directiva, con la misión de consolidar el proyecto del anterior presidente y del director Rafael Doménech Pardo, que también se había puesto al frente de la banda unos años antes. 

El mismo año de su llegada a la presidencia, la Unión Musical ganó el primer premio en el Certamen Internacional de Música de Altea, convirtiéndose en el primer galardón que conseguiría la banda en su historia y en la antesala de muchos otros reconocimientos que llegarían después. 

Destacan asimismo importantes iniciativas llevadas a cabo por Jaume Antón con el objetivo de promocionar Benidorm y la Marina Baixa a través de la música, ofreciendo a la vez un ocio educativo a los jóvenes de la localidad. Entre ellos, se llevaron a cabo intercambios en los que otras bandas vecinas visitaban la localidad, y viajes culturales donde se paseaba el nombre de Benidorm por toda España.

Además de la música de banda, Jaume Antón también fue un amante de la música tradicional y de la xirimita y el tabalet. En el año 1983, junto a Sebastián Antón, hizo las gestiones necesarias para iniciar las enseñanzas musicales de ambos instrumentos en la Escuela de Música de la Unión Musical por parte de Francisco Jesús-María Romero, Paco ‘Bessó’, para las cuales un año después el Ayuntamiento proporcionaría un espacio específico en un local municipal. 

Este gesto, junto a su impulso en la Unión Musical y su apoyo en los años de gestación del Conservatorio Municipal, dan cuenta de su vocación educativa y de cara a la juventud. Se estima que durante sus 20 años como presidente de la UMB, unos 200 músicos se incorproaron a la banda sinfónica y más de mil pasaron por la escuela de música de la entidad.  

Junto a su cargo como directivo de la UMB, también fue colaborador y miembro de distintas directivas de la Federació de Societats Musicals de la Comunitat Valenciana (FSMCV). 
Además de su aportación al pueblo de Benidorm en el ámbito de la música, también formó parte de multitud de asociaciones culturales y festivas de la localidad, como la Asociación Cultural Recreativa La Barqueta, el Rotary Club, el Club de Leones o la Cofradía de Nuestro Padre Jesús Nazareno, entre otros. Igualmente, fue mayoral de las Fiestas Mayores Patronales en 1981 y 1982, y presidente de la Comissió de 1990. 

Entre los reconocimientos que se le han brindado por parte del Consistorio hasta la fecha, cuenta con la Medalla Corporativa Municipal, que le fue concedida en el año 1995, mientras que el 9 de octubre de 2023, ya como presidente de honor de la Unión Musical, recibió la Distinció Cultural ‘Ciutat de Benidorm’.

Rafael Doménech Pardo

Born in Anna (Valencia) in 1942, he began his musical studies with Maestro Vicente Marín, excelling from a young age as a saxophonist, an instrument for which he later earned his teaching degree with top honours. In 1970, he arrived in Benidorm as a member of the musical group “Los Sonartis,” performing in various local venues. Two years later, he became a woodwind instructor at the Benidorm Musical Union, when Don Bernabé Sanchís was the director and José Pérez Barceló its president.

In December 1976, Doménech Pardo took over as director of the Benidorm Musical Union and its Music School. From then on, his dedication to teaching and his technical and personal qualities fostered an environment of excellence, hard work, and study within the Musical Union. This led him, in the following years, to incorporate string instruments into the symphonic band for the first time, as well as to create the youth band.

Simultaneously, he was a municipal employee of Benidorm City Council from 1979, when he obtained the position of municipal music teacher. With the support of the City Council and the Unión Musical (Musical Union), he participated in the creation of the Benidorm Choral Group, officially presented on April 24, 1981. During the following years as a municipal employee, he promoted cultural projects such as the Benidorm Provincial Band Competition; the International Music Course (1989); and the "Villa de Benidorm" Festival Music Competition (1995), as well as the school concerts called "Música a l'escola" (Music in Schools), which further contributed to the steady increase in students at the Unión Musical School.

Faced with this surge in students at the Unión Musical School, the City Council, with the support of the Alicante Conservatory of Music, requested the establishment of a ‘Regional School of Music and Dance,’ which was inaugurated as a recognised centre in the 1983-1984 academic year, the precursor to the José Pérez Barceló Municipal Professional Conservatory of Music.

As a composer, he is the author of more than forty works of various genres, including ‘Fiesta en Benidorm,’ a pasodoble dedicated by Don Rafael to the musicians of the Unión Musical and premiered in 1978, which since 2018 has been the Official Anthem of the Benidorm Patron Saint Festivities.

Upon his retirement, Rafael Doménech handed over the baton at the Santa Cecilia concert of the Unión Musical in December 2006, although since then he continues to enjoy concerts and participate in the social and cultural life of the city, as well as conducting the official anthem every year at the start of the Patron Saint festivities.

Among the recognitions he has received so far, he has, among others, the Gold Badge of the City; he is an Honorary Citizen of Benidorm, a distinction that was granted to him by plenary agreement on December 19, 1986; and, more recently, he was awarded the Cultural Distinction of the City of Benidorm, granted on October 9, 2015.

José Antonio Añón Ramón

José Antonio Añón Ramón, originally from Onteniente and a resident of Benidorm since 1971, was one of the founders of Horizontes Scout Group of Benidorm in 1978 and its first leader until 1998, when he passed away at only 58 years old.

In April 1978, before the group's official founding, a group of parents of young people from Benidorm took the initiative to send their children to summer camp. This initial experience was made possible thanks to the help and advice of José Antonio Añón's sister, who led the Denia Scout Group, among others. The chosen summer camp was in Alcalalí, in the summer of 1978, and this first experience ended with an unexpected forest fire that resulted in the evacuation of the young people and the camp equipment.

Despite this setback, which could have ended the idea before it was officially established, the desire to create a scout group never wavered, and people like José Antonio Añón, with their commitment and dedication, succeeded in conveying the importance of having a scout group in Benidorm. They believed in the project and saw what scouting could contribute to Benidorm and, above all, to its young people.

From those early days, the group became involved in scouting associations, and José Antonio Añón's good work extended beyond the Horizontes Scout Group. When the group joined the Baden-Powell Scouts (SBP) organisation, he served as the national commissioner for the Levante Zone. Also during those early years, significant activities and initiatives were developed, such as the 1st Baden-Powell Scouts Camporee of Spain in 1982, which brought together more than 5,000 scouts from all over the country in Benidorm under the motto "Un reto a la ilusión."

From its inception, the Horizontes Scout Group, led by José Antonio Añón, became an integral part of Benidorm's community life, collaborating and participating in various events such as the Flower Offering to the Virgin of Suffrage, volunteering at different sporting events, and even organizing the Three Kings Parade in Benidorm for several consecutive years. This demonstrated not only its role in a significant youth movement at the national level, but also its capacity to respond to the needs of its immediate community: Benidorm.

During his time as group leader, Horizontes Scout Group trained and educated dozens of children and young people from Benidorm, instilling in them the values ​​of Scouting, a love for nature, and a commitment to building a better world. In the weeks following the Ribadavia summer camp in July 1998, coinciding with the group's 20th anniversary, news arrived of José Antonio Añón's illness. He was finally laid to rest at the Church of San Jaime and Santa Ana on December 21st of that same year, passing away at the age of 58. Throughout the history of this group, which is about to celebrate its 50th anniversary and currently has over a hundred active members, José Antonio Añón's memory has never faded, both in Benidorm and in other youth associations within the Scout movement.

As an example, on September 28, 2019, José Antonio Añón posthumously received the Silver Medal for Scout Merit, one of the most prestigious awards in Valencian Scouting, in a moving tribute held at the Sequía Mare park, whose youth hostel will now bear his name.