Casa del Cordón (Burgos, SPAIN)

Travelling around on tour with an orchestra means that I get to see some pretty interesting cultural sites when there are no other patrons around... a sort of private viewing at times. The Casa del Cordón in Burgos (Spain) was built in the 15th century as a public building serving a civic function. The building is built in a Gothic style of architecture, cut from blocks of solid stone.

Currently, it serves as as a Headquarters for one of the larger Spanish banks, the Caixa Bank whilst also serving double duty as a cultural museum in some of the attached rooms. The main atrium of the bank serves double duty in the evenings (or weekends) as a concert venue, with the formerly open area now covered by a roof. The stone of the building gives the atrium an amazing acoustic to play in as the sound just travels so easily and reflects off all the hard surfaces. On the negative side, it also means that the sound rapidly gets over saturated and it can feel like you are playing with multiple orchestras as the sounds get trapped and reflected in the upper floors.

From the main atrium, you can see the various cultural treasures that hail from the surrounding areas of Castille and Leon which were formerly powerful European states. In the daytime, you can visit these museum areas, however, as I was there in the evening (long past opening hours) I was prevented from going through to these areas. I could only enjoy the treasure from behind guarded and alarmed glass doors.

Likewise, we had the run of the bank areas as our 'dressing rooms' and backstage areas... however, it was all under the supervision of vigilant bank guards... and I'm definitely sure that we didn't get to access the secure areas!

On the other hand, it was Christmas time, and there were some pretty intricate Nativity scenes set up in the atrium. It is hard to capture on photos how delicate and captivating these scenes were. You can't see the moving parts in the scenes or the play of the lighting in still photos...

These was also a gigantic Christmas tree set up for the season's festivities... oddly decked out in blue?!?!

If you are in the vicinity of Burgos, the Casa del Cordón is definitely worth a visit to see some of the artifacts and the building from a time when Castille and Leon was at the height of it's power in Europe. Although, there are other castles and monasteries in the vicinity that are much more impressive to see!

It is still amazing that these historical structures are still standing.... coming from a country (Australia) where our oldest lasting constructed buildings are only on the order of 200 years old, it stlll blows my mind to know that I am standing in a place that has lasted over 600 years!