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 Primavera Sound Festival |
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The Barcelona Festival was created in the hands of the Caixa , though they acted more as the Festival s promoter and organizer, than its sponsor. Still, inspite this scenario, 28 years later the Caixa still supports this music cycle, one of the activities of a social, educational, scientific, environments and cultural nature. Because of these goals in mind, the Foundation invests an annual budget of 184 million euros to see the happening year in and year out. Music is one of the most important parts of the Foundation s cultural programs and the Early Music Festival is the most traditional and long-running activity of all its annual events. It can be safely said that Barcelona music festivals had quite a late up start. Boston Festival in the USA and Early Music America were formed in 1985 and the Versailles Centre for Baroque Music, in 1988. Thus, while in 1977 early music already had its champions, it was still very much a minority adventure that evolved from the vision and spirit of its pioneers, taking it awhile also for Barcelona to catch up.
By 1978, the first Barcelona Early Music Festival had already taken place yet at that time there were people with the experience of Jordi Casas and Enric Gispert working as assessors. Gispert was the man with the biggest knowledge of early music at the time; he was the great inspiration behind the Festival and yet early music had very little presence in music programming in Barcelona and the rest of Spain at that time. The best known works by composers like Bach and Handel were programmed, but even the manner in which these composers were performed was yet to employ historical performance criteria. The music festival then was not yet that popularized and it had yet to gather the support that it enjoys immensely today. However, the Caixa continued to hold on to the concept even when concert attendances haven t lived up to their expectations.
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Today, it is now a growing industry. Situated at the foot of Mont Montjuic , site of the Olympic Games, the Poble Espanyol is a walled enclosure area, a watercolor painting which portrays the different peoples and cultures of Spain, represented in the form of streets and squares, monuments and buildings. Mont Montjuic , the biggest urban park of Barcelona , is close to Pla Espanya , a central square with good communications and buses connecting to the rest of the city. From Pla Espanya to Poble Espanyol , it s only a 5 - 10 minute walk. An important tourist attraction by day, it becomes a pumping party area by night, where music spins its records to make fabulous things happen.
Over the years, the Festival s program gradually began to evolve and cover new, complementary facets. These events now include family concerts, master classes with some of the greatest early music performers, lectures, and the Fringe Festival , one of the most interesting initiatives pursued in the Festival setting and which has made it even more attractive in recent years. Indeed, the Festival has always been about diversification; to expand horizons, help people increase their knowledge of early music and to create new audiences.
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The Fringe Festival is set up as a competition offering the selected groups the chance to perform in the context of the Festival. Apart from fulfilling the goal of the festival for diversification, it also fosters the appearance and promotion of new music. It is also a way in which young performers can gain access to the programs patronized by the Caixa Foundation. Fringe concerts are very common in major European festivals including Edinburgh, Utrecht and Avignon. Each year, a lucky eight groups are selected to perform in the courtyards and plazas of the Gothic Area of Barcelona .
In recent years a number of interesting groups have come out of these concerts and have gone on to establish themselves in the music scene.
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