This season Josep Pons has completed a decade as musical director of the Liceu and responsible for the improvement plan for artistic bodies. Season that now ends with a tour de force for the orchestra: Parsifal, his debut today at the Paris Opéra with Bluebeard’s Castle, the concert on the beach open to everyone, the tour of the territory and the participation in the Grec. A good moment to take stock and introduce one of the rehearsals of this title by Bartók, which is part of the exchange of orchestras that was agreed upon while Gustavo Dudamel was in charge of the French theatre. It’s a pity that the Venezuelan leadership has decided to put an end to this short stage.
That September of 2012, Pons arrived at the Liceu with his homework written down: a memory of what had to be done artistically and logistically. And as he points out, he has not deviated one millimeter. “I will have gone further or less, for a matter of time or money or whatever, well let’s not forget that I have enjoyed two crises, the economic one, with the 2012 cuts, and the pandemic. But the compass has not changed. The tunnel boring machine is doing and it will come out where it has to come out â€.
It already happened to him with the other projects that he has forged throughout his career: the Chamber Orchestra of the Teatre Lliure, the JONC, that of Granada and the ONE. “I think about the project and, on the day of lucidity, I put it in writing.” At the Liceu, a structure and regulations had to be built that would allow them to develop, he assures. It was necessary to invigorate the music department and replace the positions that had been lost –40 will have been created in this decade, if the remaining 9 are completed by 2026 to add 94–. And you had to have a symphonic series to work on more detailed aspects, as well as a season of chamber music.
“We have needed to make more recordings, since they are essential to improve, in each one you have to do something impeccable at least once. And also more tours. Although those of the territory are as important as going to Parisâ€, points out the teacher.
“An orchestra -continues Pons- is like a team of scientists, a football team or the editorial staff of a newspaper. Apart from playing well, you have to feel good. In those years we have managed to spread the idea around the world that the Liceu Orchestra is worth going to play, that it is something special, and we have magnificent young musicians. This orchestra has been conducted by Toscanini, Menotti, Prokofiev, Falla… the only Spanish orchestra with that impressive curriculum. And the day we have good acoustics it will be incredible. The acoustics in the end is 80% of the soundâ€.
Pons remembers that when he arrived at the Liceu he proposed to enter Catalan homes by broadcasting a massive open-air concert at the start of the season. “Because an opera orchestra is anonymous, invisible, you have to put a face on it, make it feel like your own. It is what you have to achieve, that they love us, to be the other Barça in the city. Because now this Symphony is like the Barça of the good times. Of course there are tensions, in rehearsals we are going to slit the throat, although always with respect and participation. But when you create a positive spiral it pulls you up.”
