A festival that "fights autotune and microwave culture"

Barcelona"Let's avoid microwave culture," says Estel Solé, co-director of the Periferia Cultura festival, which will celebrate its third edition in different regions of the country from May 31 to October 31. We are at the Espai Bosià in Barcelona, ​​​​where chef Sergi de Meià prepares dishes with ancestral recipes (some dating back to the 13th century). Journalists listen with reverential silence to the chef's hypnotic explanations about partridges, pumpkin dishes, and white food. They also try to follow the details that Solé and Marçal Girbau, the festival's other director, share about an eminently musical program that includes names like Roger Mas, María del Mar Bonet, Quimio Portet, Remedio de Ca la Fresca, Marina Rossell, Feto, Sa Pena, and Adrià Puntí. In addition, there will be special projects, such as the on-stage reunion of Bisbal natives Carles Sanjosé (Sanjosex) and Jaume Pla (Mazoni), the joint performance by Joan Colomo and Selma Bruna (ex-Marala), the intimate, unamplified Eléctrica Dharma, and the glosses of the '. Gastronomy will also play a relevant role, led by Sergi de Meià, a chef who proposes "recovering the Catalan gastronomic spirit."

"We defend rigorous live performance, or rigorous live performance. We avoid music with pre-recorded sequences and autotune as much as we can," says Girbau, who knows it goes "against the trend." "A dish reheated in the microwave is not the same as a freshly cooked dish. And the same goes for the musical experience," adds the co-director of a festival who insists on "the need to build alternative narratives to the macro-festival model." Part of the Cultural Periphery's narrative, the one that has to do with rootedness in specific places and decentralization, is shared by other spring and summer programs such as the Pyrenees Early Music Festival, Deltebre Danza, Dansàneu, the (a)phónica de Banyoles, and the Eufònic, among others.

There's also a determination to defend the peripheral nature of artists who, as Girbau says, "are outside the commercial circuits" of the summer. "In the winter they can do it, but they have more difficulties in the summer because the major festivals are increasingly resembling festivals," he adds. The model proposed for 2023 is concerts in venues with capacities between 100 and 500 people: a program of forty dates—"76 artists from across the linguistic spectrum spread across 35 towns"—deployed in Urgell, Lluçanès, Baix Penedès, Riudarenes, Riudares, la Bodega de Ter, Sant Félix de Codines, Mura, and Sant Esteban de Palautordera.

Compared to previous years, Perifèria Cultura presents some geographical and artistic innovations. For example, the incorporation of Baix Penedès as a venue and the more prominent role of the circus and the glosa, the improvised song. "The glosa is the antithesis of the concert with canned music. In the glosa, nothing is even rehearsed," says Girbau, who also highlights his political capacity. "We have the country in a deep sleep, and we want to set alarm clocks." "We're shooting from the bottom up, defending the language in a political battle," says Solé, a defender, like Girbau, of the satirical power of gloss. This critical spirit will be present in Rostits, the program of monologues featuring Sergi López, Empar Moliner, Esperanceta Gassia, Maria Nicolau, and Elisenda Roca, among others. The goal is to use satire to inspire grillers shoot against anything that "deserves a good beating".

The festival will open on May 31st at Mur Castle (Pallars Jussà) with an Occitanist programme: on the one hand, a show by Francesc Ribera, Titus, about Guillermo de Berguedà, the 12th century troubadour; on the other, the Aranese Alidé Sans, who last year made her remarkable album ArraitzThe evening will be completed with the barbecue of Esperanceta Gassia, "the irreverent godmother of the valleys of Àneu", and the gastronomic proposal of Sergi de Meià, which will include a ladle with xisqueta by Cal Tomàs. This format of monologue, music, and food between concerts will be a regular feature at the Periferia Cultural 2025.

The fact that there are concerts in Baix Penedès this year will surely mean that the total attendance at the festival will exceed the 9,000 people of 2024. However, growth is not the goal, if not the evil. To achieve this, they are working with a budget of between 400,000 and 500,000 euros, of which 50% is public funding. "But it remains to be seen what the Generalitat's participation will be," says Girbau, because the subsidies have not yet been resolved (and the Government still has no approved budget). They do have an agreement with the Lleida Provincial Council that guarantees 25,000 euros per year for four years.