In 1974 Jose Mª Ferrero composed two Moorish marches: Marroquíes de Petrel, dedicated to the comparsa of the same name and to which D. Hipólito Navarro belonged. Hipólito Navarro, friend and organiser of the 1st Congress of the UNDEF, held in Villena; and a second one entitled OVANA ( antoniO lacueVA olciNA), dedicated to his close friend Antonio Lacueva. It so happened that in August the Caja de Ahorros del Sureste (Southeast Savings Bank) announced a composition prize at the same time that
during the first week of September the aforementioned Congress was held, in which Jose Mª Ferrero collaborated in the organisation of the musical section and in which nine festive compositions were to be premiered, among them a Moorish march of his own. Ferrero hesitated between which one to present at
each event, but it was his teacher, Father Pérez-Jorge, who convinced him that Ovana should be in the gala concert as it was a totally new work with a different compositional concept. The result was, first prize with Marroquíes de Petrel in the Caja del Sureste competition, awarded by the technical jury without interpretation, and admiration after the performance by the Villena municipal band of the aforementioned Ovana march. For its part, Marroquíes de Petrel was premiered in public on 15th December of the same year, performed by the Sociedad Unión Artística Musical de Ontinyent.
In the score Ferrero dedicates it to the Moroccans: ‘To live for a few moments in a small barracks of the Marroquies de Petrel is like being in the Harem at a Muslim festival. So let this modest composition go, so that the festivals may continue unceasingly with harmony and cordiality’.