His election as Maestro de Capilla (choirmaster), after the death of Salas in 1803, was an extraordinary event.
It had been a foregone conclusion that Francisco José Hierrezuelo, long-time assistant of Salas, would be elected.
Blind with rage, and fearing the bishop had planned a conspiracy to thwart him, Hierrezuelo refused to take the examination, picked up his pen and wrote infuriated letters.
The bishop persuaded the German, Juan Nepomucino Goetz, to renounce his candidacy, but Hierrezuelo had so offended the bishop and the town council by his irate letters that, despite grovelling apologies, he got only a minor position in the chapel.
Under his hand, the church became a library, an academy, a concert hall and a rehearsal space.