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XVI FESTIVAL INTERNACIONAL DE MÚSICA PÓRTICO DO PARAÍSO

May 5-14, 2023

PROGRAMME

Ancient Ensemble (Portugal)
Americantiga Ensemble
Friday, May 5, 2023 – 8:30 p.m.
Liceo de Ourense
http://www.porticodoparaiso.com/americantiga-ensemble

Piano (Galicia)
Fabio Álvarez
Sunday, May 7, 2023 – 7:00 p.m.
Mosteiro de Santo Estevo de Ribas de Sil
http://www.porticodoparaiso.com/fabio-alvarez

String quartet (Portugal)
Quarteto Alcipe
Wednesday, May 10, 2023 – 8:30 p.m.
Igrexa de Santo Anxo
http://www.porticodoparaiso.com/quarteto-alcipe

Violín, viola and accordion (U.K.)
Kosmos Ensemble
Friday, May 12, 2023 – 8:30 p.m.
Liceo de Ourense
http://www.porticodoparaiso.com/kosmos-ensemble

Vocal consort (U.K.)
The Orlando Consort
Sunday, May 14, 2023 – 7:00 p.m.
Mosteiro de Santa María de Oseira
http://www.porticodoparaiso.com/the-orlando-consort

In light of this new edition, I would like to highlight on the one hand that we are programming one more concert, going back to the five we had years ago. This has been possible, above all, thanks to the collaboration of the Portuguese government, which for the second consecutive year has been more receptive and sensitive than our INAEM, which ignores us. And on the other, that despite our precarious economic situation, we have done everything possible so that The Orlando Consort returns to our Festival. And this effort had to be made now or never, because this legendary English vocal quartet is going to put an end to its thirty-five-year career, offering us its last concert in Europe and the penultimate in its history, which will close a few days later at the Early Music Festival of Boston (USA).
I can assure you that the always difficult balance between the production and the artistic line of the Festival that we have boasted of all these years, has become unbalanced in favor of the latter. And it is that the occasion as I said did not admit delays. We hope that our public does not perceive it, and instead values our audacity even more, which offers them the opportunity to attend concerts of this level in our city and province, some of which are practically impossible to see in Spain.

The Festival is inaugurated by the Lisbon group Americantiga Ensemble. After Mozart’s magnificent Requiem last year in the church of Santiago das Caldas that so good taste left us, the group returns with another formation, two sopranos, baritone and two guitars to make a program entitled «La Música de Salão na Corte Brasileira no tempo da Independência 1822 – 2022,» composed by Modinhas, Canzonette and Divertimentos. It is a program commemorating this ephemerides, which given the quality of the group, we could not let go.

After this, the Festival re-programmed piano, and there are three consecutive editions, receiving the fantastic pianist Fabio Alvarez, native of A Pobra de Trives, who after his prolonged stay in New York returns to Spain to present his second record work dedicated to the American minimalist composer Philip Glass. As with The Orlando Consort, we had to take this opportunity to join the tour dedicated to this record release, congratulating ourselves on giving a young artist of the house the opportunity to present himself at our Festival.

In the equator of the Portico we welcome a very interesting and curious string quartet from Lisbon, the Quartet Alcipe that although as a quartet its story is short, is composed of musicians with an admirable training and experience. And I say curious because for the first time for many we will hear a quartet that plays with gut strings, to get closer to the sonority of the era of the authors performed, Haydn and Almeida Mota, a contemporary Portuguese chapel master and composer of the father of classicism.

Kosmos Ensemble is an uncommon virtuoso English trio, on the one hand because of the originality of the formation itself (violin viola and accordion) and on the other, and above all because they move masterfully between two sound worlds, classical and world music. We will be offered a program with Piazzolla, Sarasate or Corelli, but also with a lot of popular music and a certain dose of improvisation. It is a pleasure to reschedule them, after cancelling their concert in 2020 when the state of alarm came into effect. That year we did have Festival, but it truncated in half.

And we got to the closing concert. Our audience knows them perfectly but for those who do not, I must tell them that we are before one of the best vocal quartets of ancient music on the planet, The Orlando Consort, also performing in the refectory of the Monastery of Santa Maria de Oseira. It will be the fourth and last time they visit us, with a program that will represent an extraordinary sonic experience, a journey in time that will allow us to taste from the earliest polyphony written almost a thousand years ago to the melodies and harmonies of the best composers of the European Renaissance. Access to that music, in that place and with those performers is a sublime experience, and given the impending withdrawal of the group, unrepeatable.

From the dawn of polyphony back in the 10th century, to the music of a current composer like Philip Glass. Pure eclecticism, pure Portico do Paraíso. A different Festival. Imperative.

Juan Enrique Miguéns
Artistic Director of Festival Pórtico do Paraíso

Organizer

Asociación Cultural Pórtico Musical de Ourense
info@asociacionporticomusical.org
http://www.asociacionporticomusical.org

Artistic director

Juan Enrique Miguéns
director@porticodoparaiso.com
http://www.miguens.es

Coordinator

Conchi da Silva
info@porticodoparaiso.com
http://www.shellyart.com

Web

Manuel González
webmaster@porticodoparaiso.com
http://www.porticodoparaiso.com

Address

Festival de Música Pórtico do Paraíso

Apdo. 1219 – 32080 Ourense

Spain