The thing was born as all the crazy and futureless plans are born in the gangs of friends. A "what if we set up a bar?" with music and top-notch footballers as protagonists. "What if we learn to play an instrument?" Was what was heard in the Athletic locker room in preseason . Only 24 hours later, order: "What if we set up a group?" And not only did they set it up, but after almost a year they continue with it.

Dani García the drums, De Marcos, Vesga and Balenziaga the guitars, Lekue the bass and Villalibre trumpet singer in hand. Of them, only De Marcos mastered his instrument - he had insisted on doing it a year before to play at his wedding - when this madness called Orsai, the name chosen for the group, began. "But no idea about anything, about do-re-mi-fa-sol and nothing else," Lekue acknowledges on the other end of the phone.

Orsai rose to fame shortly before Christmas, when they recorded a Basque version of a song (Lau teilatu) for a charity marathon on Basque television. What looked like a punctual bilbainada for a good cause turned out to be something much more serious, at least more formal. “Until September,” says Lekue, “we were self-taught, each one learning on our own with YouTube videos. Then we decided to rent a place and hire a private teacher. And now, with the nonsense, we have a group ».

From singing in the Lezama gym and pretending to play instruments with the first thing they picked up, they have now cultivated this new passion with discipline. They have already renewed instruments twice, they rehearse together at least twice every week , once with the teacher and once on their own, and whenever they can at least an hour a day each on their own. In his repertoire, versions of Fito and Eskorbuto. The motivation to the maximum.

Concert

"We have pasted some terrible plates in the locker room, if several of the group meet at the dining table, we are talking about it all the time and in the end they end up sending us to hell," says the Athletic side. The idea was to invite all his colleagues at the end of the season to their rehearsal room for a private concert, as they already did with their girlfriends - "we wanted more than we did, really".

Those plans, of course, have been blown up by the pandemic. Like the training sessions in Lezama, Orsai's rehearsals at his Zorrozaurre location had to be canceled. But since there is no harm that for good does not come, Lekue says that they have taken advantage of the confinement to continue progressing separately: «We have given individual classes with the teacher, we have sent videos to each other and talked by video call once a week. We have improved a lot, I have even taken the opportunity to learn to play the guitar too ».

The future of the group, they assume, is uncertain because of their profession, because perhaps not everyone will continue with Athletic next season. On the horizon, a Cup final and, perhaps, playing in San Mamés if they win it: "Villalibre said it and I can't jump off the boat now, but I don't know, to do that you have to have many ...".

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