The solar eclipse that will occur in August provides the conceptual framework for the sixth edition of the Jordi Savall Festival, which will be held from August 10 to 16 in Santes Creus, Montblanc, Valls, and Alcover. There will even be a special concert to follow the eclipse on August 12 by Josep Maria Marí, which will take place in "a space yet to be revealed." "We will summon spectators to a location and take them where the concert will be held," informs the festival's general director, Martí Sancliment. "The eclipse prevents us from seeing an object because there is another object. The festival's objective is to illuminate what remains hidden, and to talk about what lies beyond eclipses," said Savall at a press conference at the Palau Moja in Barcelona. This is the light that guides the programming of an edition that includes concerts by the Quatuor Mosaïques, French cellist Christophe Coin, pianist Olga Pashtxenko, Belgian violinist Tcha Limberger (with the Budapest Gipsy Ensemble), and Senegalese singer and chorister Momi Maiga, among others, in addition to Jordi Savall's various ensembles.

Jordi Savall, an eminent musician, has been awarded the Ernst von Siemens Prize, one of the highest international distinctions in the field of music, often compared to the Nobel Prizes. "The Nobel Prizes of music," they say, although given the decline of some Nobel Prizes (the Peace Prize, for example), they may cease to be as prestigious a benchmark as they once were. The Ernst von Siemens Prize—awarded by the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts on behalf of the foundation dedicated to the magnate who rebuilt Siemens Industries after World War II—does, for now, enjoy unquestionable prestige: it has been awarded since 1974 and—as you can read in Xavier Cervantes's reportIt has been awarded to some of the most important figures in 20th-century music, such as Britten, Messiaen, Segovia, Barenboim, Abbado, and Bernstein, to name just a few of the best known. Now, Jordi Savall deservedly joins this illustrious list.

Jordi Savall (Igualada, 1941) won this Thursday the Ernst von Siemens prizeThe award, one of the most prestigious in the world of music, is presented by the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts on behalf of the Ernst von Siemens Foundation for Music since 1974. It comes with a prize of €250,000, and previous recipients include Benjamin Britten, Olivier Messiaen, Leonard Bernstein, and Claudio Abbado. The award ceremony will take place on May 23 at the Prinzregententheater in Munich and will include a special concert by Hesperion XXI and the Royal Chapel of Catalonia, conducted by Jordi Savall.

It is impossible to reproduce the sociocultural context of 18th-century Peru, let alone the popular dances and music that existed outside the conventions of courtly life and the structures of the European Baroque. And even less so in a setting like the Gran Teatre del Liceu, a temple more contemplative than participatory. What is possible, however, is to recreate the sound of the music that Bishop Baltasar Jaime Martínez de Compañón commissioned to be recorded and later compiled in the Trujillo Codex of Peru, a documentary treasure of the Baroque in Latin America. It is even possible to propose choreographies based on the watercolors found in the same codex. And above all, it is possible for everything to sound and be danced with both rigor and joy. It is precisely this—rigor and joy—that the performance conveys. the show Creole festival presented by Jordi Savall at the Liceu with musicians from his ensembles and the collaboration of the Tembembe Ensamble Continuo and the dancers of ArteSon Danza México.

"It's a journey back to the 18th century, to the richness of a people who expressed themselves through music and dance. It's music that touches the heart," explains Jordi Savall about the Creole festivalwhich he is conducting this Thursday at the Gran Teatre del Liceu (7:30 p.m.). "They are not courtly dances. The Creole festival "It's conceived from a different angle, that of the people dancing for the people, for the sheer joy of dancing," says Mexican choreographer María del Carmen Ochoa. "My work is about freezing time, and I've constructed a very imaginative, dreamlike narrative, following the songs," says artist Santi Moix. "Without everyone's involvement," as the maestro says, everyone has created a unique spectacle featuring musicians from Le Concert des Nations and the Tembembe Ensamble Continuo, singers from La Capilla Real de Cataluña, and dancers from the ArteSon Danza México company, in addition to the visual work created by Moix specifically for the performance. Creole festival

The artist Frederic Amat He settled in Vallvidrera in the late 80s. He renovated two houses with the help of architect friends to create his home and studio, and over the years he has turned them almost into a work of art: the house has, on one of the facades, some deformed pots like the ones in the mural he did for the Mercat de les Flors, for the Teatro del Matadero in Lleida. The property is on a slope and, below it all, among fig and pine trees, there are some of the gigantic chrysalides which he exhibited at La Pedrera in 2017.

"It will be a tribute to diversity, but also to friendship, beauty, and the great power of music," explains Jordi Savall about the fifth edition of the Jordi Savall Festival, which will be held from August 11 to 17. The Santes Creus monastery will continue to be the central venue for a program that will also spread throughout Montblanc and, for the first time, will reach Valls and the Convent of the Arts in Alcover. As usual, the festival will combine concerts by Savall's groups with other guest artists. "I'm very excited because it's very diverse and has very contrasting programs," says Savall, who, at the press conference held this Thursday at the Palau Moja in Barcelona, recalled the utopian element that led him to create the festival. "Without utopia, there is no creativity," he said.

The Ballet du Capitole de Toulouse and Jordi Savall, leading his ensemble Le Concert des Nations, starred on Sunday at the Liceu in the premiere of a show that revives two old ballets by Christoph Willibald Gluck, Semiramis and Don JuanAlthough the original choreographies have been lost, the two works are considered the first ballets in the strict sense of the term, since until then, in the 18th century, dance was merely a form of pantomime accompanying music.

"Every leg we have in Toulouse will see it on stage," promises Beate Vollack, director of the Ballet of the Opéra du Capitole de Toulouse. The company, with 35 dancers, will perform two original choreographies about two symbols of freedom without corsets, the Don Juan and the Semiramis, with music by Christoph Willibald von Gluck performed by Le Concert des Nations under the direction of maestro Jordi Savall. The show can be seen from March 23 to 29 at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, included for the first time in the Dansa Metropolitana festival.