Jordi Savall has found a summer refuge in Santes Creus where he can stop for a few days, while his festival is celebrated. "Because I would like to stop traveling so much," he says while sipping his breakfast tea. The musical contest looks very beautiful this year, as if the 82-year-old maestro had been organizing it all his life. The townspeople stop him on the street. He enters the artisan grocery store to greet the shopkeepers – “they have been in this store for 60 years!” – and no one in the town would say that the Jordi Savall Festival was only launched three years ago.
“I performed at the Reial Monestir a couple of times a long time ago and, when we ran out of the festival in Poblet, I quickly thought of this wonderful place,” he says, referring to the jewel of Cistercian art from the 12th century in Catalonia that is in the capital of the municipality. from Aiguamurcia. There, flanked by a baroque square that... "anyone would say that we are in Italy, right?".
Savall has been chaining emotions for a few days: in Salzburg he experienced a huge reception from the public and critics last week with Beethoven's symphonies, and on Monday he took to Santes Creus the project of The four seasons played only by women, as happened in Vivaldian Venice with the girls of the Ospedale della Pietà, the convent, hospice and music school from which composers such as Anna Bon and Vincenta da Ponte emerged. Monday was a breath of beauty that shakes the soul, although outdoors you had to tune the gut strings every two by three.
Was this success expected from the women's orchestra?
Yes, because in itself it is already a very risky bet, because you cannot look for the best, but the best of the best. But they have been of incredible quality and professionalism. And the strongest: there is a great atmosphere, a communion between them, a joy, an extraordinary commitment. This concert in a mixed group would be totally different.
Different because this level of communion would not be achieved?
Exactly. We all know that between men and women there is always a conflict that can be latent, because what happens in the world also happens in orchestras.
They sounded especially organic, alive, fresh, subtle...
A lot. We gave this concert in Fontfreda and in Graz, where people applauded for almost 20 minutes. It was wonderful. One of the girls, already behind the stage, cried with emotion and joy for having been capable of what we did. It was so nice... They live this experience in a very profound way, because they feel responsible, they work, they want to do it well. There is respect and great human quality. And there is a harmony that comes from solidarity, because they consolidate each other, there is no competition... Among men there is much more competitiveness.
He thought of paying homage to Vivaldi by emulating the Ospedale when he found that in Le Concert des Nations they had women to do a Concert des Nations Fémenin.
Yes, it was about giving them a chance, recognizing their artistic ability and seeing what they give of themselves. And I have been surprised. Vivaldi's Concerto for Four Violins was a pure wonder.
Why do you think that even today a Vienna Philharmonic resists the already natural parity?
That comes from a long way. Women have always been tried to be put aside. My grandmother was illiterate, and her brother, director of the University. In the same family these distinctions were made. She had a business, but she knew how to read just enough.
And in ancient music, how did the women who dared to create do it?
In the Middle Ages, being a musician was a servant's job. Haydn was a servant of the court, Mozart was of the archbishop. A noble could not say that she composed, it was lowering herself. That is why there are thousands of anonymous pieces in the Renaissance, and even in classical repertoires: I am convinced that these extraordinary pieces of music were composed by noble or wealthy women who did not dare to put their names. Because a man will never stop putting his name. For nature. With some musicologists we have a discussion. Those women entered the monastery but controlled the convent. Each nun had her servants and resources, they did business, bought land... and they were people who had very high musical qualities. I can't imagine that four illiterate monks could be better musicians than them.
And if they dared to sign, were there consequences?
In order not to say that they were composing, sometimes they said that they had visions, inspiration from heaven. "I have created it because God asks me to." If not, they were accused of witches and burned. If she had a creative quality, the woman was either a witch or a whore. Great composers of the Renaissance were assassinated, because the fact of showing themselves in public made them courtesans, with an easy life. There are many cases in the 16th and 17th centuries, especially in Italy, of women who are so jealous of them that they kill them. But this envy towards the feminine is a way of conserving power. Fanny Mendelssohn, very good, was not accepted in the circle of composers. And she was a great conductor, and neither. Luckily her brother supported her.
The girls at the Ospedale were lucky enough to learn from Vivaldi.
Yes, but when they became independent they were penalized. If they left the Ospedale, they couldn't play in Venice, they had to leave, because they couldn't compete with those who were still at the Ospedale.
And those of the Ospedale could show themselves when acting?
It depends, they weren't cloistered girls but they wore Venetian carnival masks to protect their identity, as they were considered courtesans. It is a fascinating world.
What has remained of the criticism received in this Salzburg that has blessed his Beethoven?
“A concert like this gives meaning to life”, they said. They are people used to a lot of quality and when they discover such a different Beethoven, they are amazed. I already had this idea of Beethoven 30 years ago: in 1994 I recorded it, but everyone criticized it. The same critics of today were not prepared for such a Beethoven.
And since you publish it, it will never be discontinued...
I never discontinue. Whenever a stock runs out, I do it again, even if it doesn't work out commercially. But it is that Alia Vox [que cumples 25 años] is not a business, it is a cultural action. As long as I live, you will have records available.
How are you financing your orchestra's trips?
It is one of the issues that worries me. I have just created a Foundation in Switzerland to collect patronage. You have to make an initial investment of 70,000 or 80,000 euros, and I do it personally. It's worth it, because the projects are special.
He has just visited Sant Felip Neri, he has met with the felipones. How have you seen the place as the Barcelona headquarters of your Foundation?
There is a lot of good will and very beautiful spaces. It would be an ideal place to have a presence in the center of Barcelona, but it is still a place for felipones and we have to share it. It will not be one hundred percent our house, it would be better to have a Teatre Lliure that you occupy. But it's fine to have offices and to be able to use the church for the Academy and rehearsals. It would be a lot.
Should we wait for the reform?
No, the reform is above all for the schools, for us we would only have to clean, paint, remove the documents of the monks who filled the cells... However, we continue to look at the Monestir de Pedralbes, there we would have more independence.
Was the experience at the Liceu with Calixto Bieito's Poppea finally unpleasant for you?
It's just that directing and having right there, at each rehearsal and each performance, two characters groping and doing everything you can imagine... or a guy who snogs the servant and then pulls out his gun and kills him...
It is the realism of Bieito.
There was violence all the time, when it is so repetitive it loses force. I think he had the right to express it. I admire Calixto's creative quality, but I can admire the quality of a musician and tell him that here he hits some shots that I don't like. Because from that pit he was trying to give instructions to an artist there at the bottom and he couldn't, almost on top of him he had another who was being strangled and screaming desperately. It was difficult for me.
Do you mean that we won't see you and Bieito together again?
I don't think it's an immediate thing. In life we have to be able to choose certain ways of doing things.
What projects do you have now?
There is A Midsummer Night's Dream that we do in Santes Creus in a reduced version and that will be seen at the Liceu in October. I have opted to put actors to play Oberón, Titania and Puck, and four more young people to act as if it were a play, which is how it should be. I also have Haydn's The Seasons, which we will also do in Barcelona, although I still don't know where. And the two Italian symphonies by Mendelssohn will come out on the record. In November the Missa Solemnis will be released, in December Charpentier's Te Deum, before the summer Vivaldi and, meanwhile, a record by contemporary Spanish and Catalan composers who wanted to pay homage to me, inspired by works from the Llibre Vermell, Couperain, etc.
