"Mozart was a creator of musical 'hits', just like Bad Bunny"

BarcelonaWhat is the thread that connects Mozart and Bad Bunny? According to the company Cabosanroque, the connection is direct and very evident: through the opera Don Giovanni. The Puerto Rican artist sings in Tití me preguntó about the women he has slept with, just as the protagonist of Mozart's opera reviews his conquests at one point in the show. "The myth of Don Juan has been revisited many, many times. Each era is responsible for reflecting on it, judging it, and deciding whether to redeem or condemn it," explains Laia Torrents, the soul of Cabosanroque along with Roger Aixut. With this mission, the company projects its gaze on Mozart's opera, linking it to the present in the show Mil tres, say cheese, which can be seen from April 8 to 19 at the Teatre Lliure de Gràcia and is co-produced by the same theater with Temporada Alta.

In recent years, Cabosanroque has approached the works of classics such as Jacint Verdaguer and Mercè Rodoreda and has created performative installations with a strong focus on sound space. Now they are bringing performers back to the stage to re-read the myth of Don Juan through music and the female characters of the opera. They do so with two sopranos –Lisa Willems and Adriana Aranda–, the singer Sandra Montfort, and the musicians Irina Soriano, Naia Membrillera, and Mar Esteban Martin. "They are all great musical performers with whom we have also worked on movement. They embody six girls who meet on an urban sports court and tell each other about their love experiences," points out Torrents.

The project originated in 2022, when the company was preparing a workshop at the Palau de les Arts in Valencia with opera students. "We wanted to talk about Don Giovanni and we wondered how we could engage them. It turned out that that year the most listened-to song on Spotify was Tití me preguntó," says Torrents. The show draws from the characters of Donna Anna, Donna Elvira, and Zenina and reflects "on unfulfilled desire, the predatory spirit of the society we live in, extreme consumerism, individualism, and egocentrism," details Torrents, who warns that "we live in a dangerous time; you only have to go on social media to see the vision young people have of feminism and machismo."

A musical "resurrection"

On stage there is no one playing Don Juan, but rather the character emerges through the gazes of the protagonists. "The creative process has raised many questions for me. How do I portray an abuser? Do I change my voice, my body? We don't have an answer," says Willems. The "resurrection" of Don Juan is also musical, according to Torrents: "Mozart was a creator of hits musical, who have been reinvented, just like Bad Bunny. They are two great musicians who generate hits that their contemporaries claim and that are interpreted, covered, and reinterpreted." In the production, and as is usual in Cabosanroque's creations, the set design will also be a source of sounds. "It's a vision we inherited from Carles Santos and have been working with for 20 years – Torrents points out –. We want to put music on stage and visualize the sound event".