"We were waiting for you. And we want to wait for you many more years." "Welcome to the Community of Madrid". "You are going to want to be in Madrid in 2024, 2025, 2026 and all subsequent years." If those responsible for the Primavera Sound festival experienced tensions with the Barcelona municipal government on account of the extension of dates at the Fòrum site, of course the Madrid political leaders have made it clear today that they are not going to experience them either in Madrid or in Arganda del Rey, where the Barcelona festival will celebrate from June 5 to 11 a "mirror" edition -as its managers have defined it- of the previous week's meeting in Barcelona, with 98% of artists in common. Which raises the inevitable question of which city will attract the largest number of spectators, especially international ones, with such a similar lineup.
The Teatros del Canal, the scenic flagship of the Community of Madrid, has been the venue chosen to present the first edition of the Primavera Sound festival in the capital of Spain, an event whose technical and transport characteristics have been explained but nothing of a program from which it is only known that Depeche Mode will act. Alfonso Lanza, director of the festival, explained that "the idea of coming to Madrid had been around our heads for a long time and after two weekends in Barcelona and seeing that we couldn't keep it there any longer, we began to receive requests for different European cities.
Everything changed, he added, when the offer from the capital was presented. "When the offer came from Madrid, we saw that we had the ideal venue, in Arganda del Rey, the only one in Europe, designed to hold festivals", he underlined. "And then there is -he remarked- the moment that Madrid is experiencing, which is spectacular, and which has sufficient hotel infrastructure and is an international hub connected to the entire planet, which is fundamental for us".
"All the circumstances are in place for an event of this magnitude and international projection," he summarized. And he recalled that they are settling down definitively, that they already have more than 30 people working in the office in the capital, that they hope to attract 100,000 visitors per day in Arganda, have an impact of more than 150 million euros and contribute to that Madrid is a cultural destination of reference. The budget for the 2023 festival between Barcelona and Madrid will be 65 million euros.
Almudena Heredero, responsible for directing the Madrid edition, has presented the virtual recreations of what the Ciudad del Rock de Arganda del Rey venue will be like, where the bulk of the festival will be from June 8 to 10, a week after the Parc del Barcelona Forum. A 350,000 square meter venue "designed specifically to hold festivals, with wide possibilities of schedules and sound and in which there will be a historical poster", he said, recalling that Depeche Mode will perform on the 9th after having performed on the 2nd in the Spring edition in Barcelona.
"It will be a mirror festival, with the same artists, the same number of bands and approximately the same number of stages", he summarized, and admitted that the challenge is mobility. That is why they will launch, he assures, an "unprecedented deployment". The point from which 400 direct shuttle buses will depart for Arganda will be the Metropolitan Stadium in Madrid, whose exterior will host the festival because it will have a concert area, a gastronomic area and will host the opening day of the free competition for the Madrid public.
In addition, just as in Barcelona the days before the great display of the weekend Spring is celebrated in the city, many emblematic rooms in Madrid will host concerts by national and international artists on the days before Arganda. The mayor of Arganda, the socialist Pedro Guillermo Hita has assured that Primavera Sound is only going to have to worry about the music, that they are going to be given all the facilities and everything is going to work like a perfect gear. The delegate of Culture of the Madrid City Council, the popular Andrea Levy, has insisted that "we were waiting for you" and that it is a festival "that unites two cities, Barcelona and Madrid".
A Madrid that he has defined as "in full force, everyone is talking and we know it, we are connoisseurs, there is a lot of focus on the capital, international eyes are on Madrid". The Minister of Culture of the regional government, Marta Rivera de la Cruz, has recalled the first meetings ten months ago, has underlined that it seemed like a dream to have this "mythical" festival and has concluded with a forceful "Welcome to the Community of Madrid".
