Jordi Savall does not want to live oblivious to the reality of his time –“musicians must be sensitive to what is happening in the world”, says the maestro and violagambist–, so the 3rd edition of his festival will be dedicated this summer “to life”, emphasizing nature and women, “especially those who fight for their dignity and freedom”.
Even the poster of the contest, by the artist Francesca Llopis, echoes the female leadership of this edition that will have 14 concerts between July 28 and August 15, to be held in Montblanc and the royal monasteries of Poblet and Santes Creus. , the latter with proposals "dedicated to history and memory".
This is how a tribute to those persecuted for their status as women in certain countries will be held in Aiguamúrcia (Tarragona), with a concert featuring singers such as Jasmin Behnawa from Afghan, Nazanin Saveh from Iran, Nai Barghouti from Palestine and Waed Bpuhassoun from Syria. , accompanied by Orpheus 21 under the baton of Savall.
The festival will feature the performance of the singer and anthropologist of Sephardic Berber origin (and also a Polish Jew) Miléna Kartowski-Aïach, who will address ancient Hebrew songs. In addition, a concert will be dedicated to the music of the 17th century Venetian composer Barbara Strozzi, conducted by Hirundo Maris, conducted by Arianna Savall and Peter U. Johansen.
Another novelty is the festival's artistic residency, which will be enjoyed by the young ensemble The Ministers of Pastime, made up of European and Latin American musicians who have met in Barcelona, and who will tackle works by the Italian Renaissance Maddalena Casulana and the Baroque artist Isabella Leonarda.
Savall himself will perform with the Capella Reial de Catalunya and the Concert des Nations to several Stabat Maters created by different European composers, apart from inviting a Ukrainian formation, the Liatoshynski Capella, to interpret the songs of the Virgin in a dialogue between Marian compositions by Ukrainian and European authors that will be a tribute to the victims of the war.
But the true scoop of the festival is the first baroque orchestra formed exclusively by women, a project that Savall begins this year with Vivaldi's Four Seasons. “In the instrumental academies that we have set up with young performers for the entirety of Beethoven, Schubert or Mendelssohn, 50% of the musicians were women, that is, 30, which was enough to make a magnificent orchestra”, she explains. “Women musicians have a different sensibility; I am not talking about quality but about an approximation. In fact we recover an idea from 300 years ago, when Vivaldi featured the women of the Ospedale della Pietà, which he premiered in 1723 ".
The festival will be inaugurated by Savall in Sant Francesc de Montblanc with medieval Jewish and Muslim music from the 12th to 14th centuries, which share the traditions of the Mediterranean. It will be followed by the Jove Capella Reial de Catalunya directed by Lluís Vilamajó, a concert with which the Poblet monastery will once again be part of the Jordi Savall Festival. The third event will cover historical Catalan music, from the Revolt of the Reapers of 1640 to the fall of Barcelona in 1714 and the Nueva Planta Decrees of 1717.
“We will do it through music from the time of oral tradition, which will allow us to listen to what moved people. We will listen to a Cant dels ocells that is not spiritual but patriotic, since with it they awaited the arrival of the archduke's fleet. And we will also hear romances from the reapers, which tell us about the terrible things that happened”, says Savall.
The closing will be a tribute to the Mendelssohn brothers, with a first part dedicated to songs about nature and the second will be a version for voices and pianoforte of A Midsummer Night's Dream, with a women's choir and Russian Olga Pashchenko at the keyboard. "I am also working with a group of actors from Bremen and Berlin to offer the complete works of Shakespeare recited on stage, which we will do at the Liceu, on October 3, and then in Paris."
To facilitate public access to the night concerts in Sants Creus, for the first time the festival has set up a coach service from Barcelona, Tarragona and Reus. The festival will again have a gastronomic space with local products.
This year's budget is 380,000 euros, of which a third are public contributions (Generalitat, Tarragona Provincial Council, Montblanc City Council and Ministry of Culture), another third comes from private contributions and the rest, from ticket sales, pointed out the coordinator of the festival, Martí Sancliment.
