Barcelona’s architectural wonders are well known – so much so that it can sometimes be a bit of an ordeal to truly experience them, amid the tourist throngs. However, a solution to this perennial problem is on offer this spring: Barcelona Obertura’s Ciutat de Clàssica festival is offering a series of 26 free concerts in several of Barcelona’s most famous and unusual buildings, allowing visitors to experience these unique architectural spaces in their own time, together with musical performances by some of the city’s best musicians.
Running from 5th March to 1st April, with over 500 artists appearing across 29 venues, Ciutat de Clàssica’s free series sits alongside a strong series of international guest artists and ensembles at the Palau de la Música Catalana, L’Auditori and Barcelona’s Liceu Opera – of which more in a moment. But it’s worth dwelling on the free concert series, as it takes in many of Barcelona’s most fascinating and significant locations.
The series’ opening concert on 5th March is held in the Antiga Fàbrica Estrella Damm – the old brewery building has become one of Barcelona’s hottest music venues – and other sites of industry are part of the series too, including a performance by the Orfeó Català choirs at former textile factory Fabra i Coats later in March. At the opposite end of the spectrum is the 14th-century Monastery of Pedralbes, with its beautiful three-storey Gothic cloister, where visitors can take in a harpsichord and viola da gamba recital.
But perhaps the highlight of the first few days of the festival will be the concerts in Antoni Gaudí’s modernista houses, Bellesguard and Casa Vicens. The architect is being celebrated all this year, 100 years since his death in 1926, and composers contemporary to Gaudí will be featured in these performances. Casa Vicens, with its striking checkerboard terracotta façade, is one of Gaudí’s first major architectural projects, completed in 1885. By contrast, Bellesguard, completed a few decades later, is not in Casa Vicens ebullient faux-Islamic style, but instead harks back to medieval designs of the 15th century, evidence of Gaudí’s restlessness when it comes to decorative inspiration. The house’s neo-medieval tower will become the venue for the string octet of the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra (OBC).
Other major Gaudí locales become performance venues too: on 17th March, Casa Batlló, also called the Casa dels ossos (“House of bones”), plays host to string players from the OBC for a late evening concert. Not normally accessible at this time, visitors can experience the sun draining away from Gaudí’s extraordinary central light well. Another of Gaudí’s early architectural experiments, Palau Güell, hosts a concert a few days later. This mansion, which like Bellesguard recalls stolid medieval and renaissance buildings, has a highly decorated interior, and a roof terrace anticipating Gaudí’s later sculptural efforts on La Pedrera.
It's not only Gaudí whose architecture features in the free festival: Ludwig Mies van de Rohe’s minimalist pavilion, a pioneering piece of modernist architecture originally completed in 1929, features in the series’ closing concert. Catalan architect Josep Lluís Sert’s building for the Joan Miró Foundation also becomes a venue, for two piano recitals on 14th March. In the midst of Parc de Montjuïc, Sert’s geometric forms in white concrete contrast perfectly with the splashes of colour in Miró’s artworks.
Other locations around Barcolona are featured in the series – including the award-winning Biblioteca Jaume Fuster, and the Torre Glòries skyscraper, by French architect Jean Nouvel. For those keen to take in views across the whole city, an event at the Torre de Collserola telecommunications tower will be also worth taking in. Several museums are included too: the Museu Europeu d’Art Modern and the Museu Frederic Marès, the latter with a collection by the museum’s namesake sculptor Marès that stretches from pre-Roman times to the 20th century.
As well as these free concerts are Ciutat de Clàssica’s ticketed events at Barcelona’s major venues: the Gran Teatre del Liceu, Palau de la Música Catalana, and L’Auditori. A heady mix of soloists, ensembles, Early music and Romantic opera, the series features many international stars whose names will be familiar. Pianists Jan Lisiecki, Vikingur Ólafsson and Elisabeth Leonskaja all make appearances, with Martha Argerich performing with Charles Dutoit and the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana at L’Auditori on 16th March.
Early music ensembles also make a strong showing, with the series featuring the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists appearing early in March for Bach’s St John Passion, and later concerts including appearances at L’Auditori by Collegium Vocale Gent, and stalwart Early music maestro Jordi Savall and Le Concert des Nations. Handel’s Orlando, one of his most celebrated dramatic works, is presented at the Liceu Opera on 24th March with period-instrument ensemble Les Musiciens du Louvre, conducted by Marc Minkowski.
Fans of Romantic music are excellently catered for too: Puccini’s Manon Lescaut with Asmik Gregorian in the title role is at the Liceu on 17th March, in a well-regarded staging by Àlex Ollé (originally from Frankfurt Opera). Alain Altinoglu and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony also make an appearance for Mahler’s resplendent Ninth Symphony on 23rd March. Bruckner’s Mass no. 2 will also be worth catching earlier in the month, performed by Balthasar Neumann Chor and Ensemble.
With an enviable density of musical talent amidst the city’s architectural marvels, in March it certainly seems Barcelona will be the place to be.
See all listings for Barcelona Obertura: Ciutat de Clàssica from 5th March to 1st April.
More information about Barcelona Obertura: Ciutat de Clàssica.
This article was sponsored by Barcelona Obertura.
