Professor of Music History at the Autonomous University of Madrid (2006) and Director of the University’s Higher Centre for Research and Promotion of Music (2012–2021), where she led the Great Authors and Performers of Music concert series at the National Auditorium. She completed her music studies at the Royal Conservatory of Music of Madrid, earning Higher Degrees in Music Theory and Accompaniment, a degree in Music Pedagogy, and a Professional Diploma in Piano. In 2000, she promoted the establishment of the Bachelor’s Degree in History and Sciences of Music, which she coordinated until 2007. She has directed 20 research projects funded by Spain’s National R&D Plan and by the Community of Madrid, focusing on court music during the Bourbon period and on the study of Don Quixote as a source of inspiration. In 2006, she founded the research group recognized by the Community of Madrid Music and Culture in the Bourbon Era, with which she has carried out significant international scholarly activity. She has taught continuously at the master’s level at Université Bordeaux Montaigne and at the University of Guanajuato (Mexico).
She has authored more than 100 articles. Among her books, whether as sole author or co-author, are: Music in the Royal Chapel of Madrid. José de Torres y Martínez Bravo (1670–1738) (1990); Days of Glory and Death. Masses by José de Torres in Honor of King Louis I (2000); Music in the Theatres of Madrid I. Antonio Rosales and the Tonadilla Escénica (2005); Theatre and Music in Spain: Short Genres in the Second Half of the 18th Century (2008); Cervantes and Don Quixote in Music: Studies on the Reception of a Myth (2007); Visions of Don Quixote in 20th-Century Music (2011); Music Printing and Publishing in Spain (18th–20th Centuries) (2012); Songs of War and Peace: Music in the Ibero-American Independences 1800–1840 (2016); Don Quixote and Music in the Construction of European Culture (2018); Musicology in the 21st Century: New Challenges, New Approaches (2019); and A Time of Exile: Sebastián Durón and Mariana of Neuburg in France (2024). She directs the recording series Music and Cervantes, in which six volumes of works related to Cervantes have been released.
She is a Trustee of the Teatro Real and of the Jacinto and Inocencio Guerrero Foundation (Madrid); a Censor Academician of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando (2016)—the first woman to hold this position on its Board of Directors—as well as a Corresponding Academician of the Royal Academy of History (2012) and of the Royal Academies of Fine Arts of Sant Jordi of Catalonia (2009), San Miguel Arcángel of the Canary Islands (2014), and San Telmo of Málaga (2023). She has been an Honorary Guest of the city of Guanajuato (Mexico) since 2006 for her contribution to the study of Cervantes. She received the Emili Pujol Research Award in Historical Musicology (1993) and the National Prize for the History of Spain (2000) for her work on the “National Anthem” in Symbols of Spain. She served as Vice President of the Spanish Society of Musicology (1998–2003) and as Director of the Journal of Musicology (1997–2002).
She has served on the jury of the Princess of Asturias Award (2026), the National Prize for the History of Spain (2018 and 2021), the National Comic Award (2019), the National Illustration Award (2019), the Ramón Menéndez Pidal National Research Award in the Humanities (2023), the María Moliner National Research Award for Young Researchers (2023), the Spanish Society of Musicology Research Award (1999 and 2011), the Emili Pujol Music Research Award (1999), and the El Ojo Crítico RNE Jury Award (2014, 2015, and 2016).