Josep Pons renews for four years as musical director of the Liceu and poses challenges

The project of artistic and musical improvement that Josep Pons has in hand at the Liceu is taking longer than imagined since it managed to get underway in 2012. The crisis of 2018 hit the theater slowing down the planned plan, if not paralyzing it, thus It is not surprising that the musical director himself has stepped forward to renew his position for four more years (until the 2025-26 season inclusive) with “the hope and firm intention of consolidating the musical project.”

“The Gran Teatre is experiencing an exceptional moment – he said – with an aligned team made up of Salvador Alemany at the helm, Valentí Oviedo piloting the ship and Víctor Garcia de Gomar devising content”. Who would want to leave in these circumstances?

Referents

Maestro Assante has stood out in theaters such as Dresden with Luisi or Thielemann and Munich with Petrenko

Pons explained the challenges that the new musical direction faces while presenting the new director of the choir to the press to replace Conxita Garcia. Maestro Pablo Assante, an Argentine artist trained as a vocal pianist and as a choir and orchestra director, has stood out in theaters such as the Semperoper in Dresden, where he came from the teacher Fabio Luisi and stayed with Christian Thielemann. He has also collaborated in theaters such as the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome or the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich under the baton of Kirill Petrenko.

The peculiarities of the Liceu choir I do not know yet. But I come without prejudice and with an open mind “

Pablo AssanteNew director of the Cor del Liceu

Assante was “very motivated and excited to work here. Inspired by the music that is what summons us all ”. Its mission, according to Pons, is to turn the Liceu choir into a benchmark choir in Europe. Asked about the way in which he intends to achieve it, the Argentine said that “the peculiarities of the Liceu choir I do not know yet. But I come without prejudice and with an open mind ”.

The agreed model of choir at the Liceu is 60 permanent singers, which is what most of the repertoire requires, and from here on to hire reinforcements on time. Thus, in three years it will be necessary to fill 9 places, and from 2017 there will be a generational change of 48.2% in the choir.

In the orchestra, the project implies that 30 new places will be incorporated in the next three seasons, a process that began in 2014-15. And the new strategic plan for growth and consolidation will have to be drawn up for the coming years.

For the improvement of the orchestra

The Liceu has signed a collaboration agreement with Harmonia Mundi France for the recording of two annual titles

Apart from consolidating the cycle of symphonic and chamber concerts with musicians from the Symphony of the Liceu, and making international exchanges and tours of the Catalan territory, one of the interesting novelties that will most result in the improvement of artistic bodies It is a collaboration agreement with the publisher Harmonia Mundi France for the recording of two titles per year. “Recording is very therapeutic, the search for an impeccable reading marks a lot the quality of an orchestra,” says Pons. We will do the first one next year ”.

In addition, the training will participate in the Caixabank 360 ° symphonic music audiovisual project, which will be presented in the autumn and which wants to be the continuity of the successful Symphony that has been installed in CaixaForum Barcelona. The orchestra will also be present on the digital platform that the Liceu plans to inaugurate next year, and will participate more in the social and educational project, considered essential for the new future design of the Liceu.

All in all, the restructuring means that the director of the music department, Antoni Pallés, will now direct the Liceu Aprén and the Liceu Apropa. So Pons wanted to have Conxita Garcia, as assistant to the musical direction given the greater amount of work. “It is of my absolute confidence – said Pons -. It will be an extension of mine ”. “Encouraging myself so that the theater is an artistic and musical reference is a stimulus to continue working”, said the one who has been director of the choir since 2015, and has been linked to the Liceu choir for 18 years and another 17 to that of Cor Jove del Palau.

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