The children of Ricardo Bofill Levà (Barcelona, ​​1939-2022) want to continue the passion that the late architect felt for music, especially for Bach, his main composer and the one who, just before he died, asked for it to be played. That is why his architecture workshop, which is now run by Ricardo and Pablo Bofill, has decided to sponsor a concert by Ibercamera, the season chaired by Josep Maria Prat and which took place precisely in the Cathedral, the nave of the old Sanson cement factory where Bofill made his studio, next to Walden 7.
This small stage and the good acoustics of the warehouse were, in May 1980, what gave rise to this Barcelona cycle that will celebrate its 40th anniversary next season. LluÃs Claret on cello and Albert Giménez-Attenelle on piano gave the first concert: Bach, Zimmermann, Guijoan, Penderecky and Kodaly. And when fifteen months ago the architect transferred the Teatre Nacional, the T1 or the Vela hotel, they performed here, in his memory, The Goldberg Variations by the pianist Varvara, the same program and the same artist that this May will be presented at the Palau de Music, with Ibercamera, sponsored by the firm Bofill.
The idea is to contribute regularly to the cycle, adding to the support that the Fundació Vila Casas has been giving for a decade: cultural institutions sponsoring culture.
Yesterday in this space, whose stage is presided over by a piano and a replica of GaudÃ’s Confident double chair, the program for the 40th season: seven international orchestras with great works from the repertoire, plus piano recitals by Martha Argerich and Maurizio Pollini.
“I was 15 years old in 1980â€, Ricardo Bofill Jr. began by explaining. “Josep Maria has always been a friend of the family, and his beginnings with the cycle explain now, 40 years later, a story that carries the DNA of Barcelona, ​​where we are losing interest in culture and art and it is necessary to encourage them to not to be left behind compared to other citiesâ€.
The first time Prat heard Glenn Gould playing Bach was in this space. It was also Bofill who discovered Camarón, whom he later represented. “Ricardo marked me a lot, I met him when I was very young and I learned from him. In the Walden there were poets, philosophers… Rubert de Ventós, Salvador Clotas or José AgustÃn Goytisolo were his collaborators. He linked art, literature, music… Architecture was just one more of the disciplinesâ€.
The 2023-24 season will start in L’Auditori de Barcelona, ​​with a commemorative gala in which Pinchas Zukerman and Maria Joao Pires, two historians of the Camera agency, will offer Beethoven’s Sonata for violin and piano Primavera, which will be followed by the Ninth by the Orquesta Nacional de Lyon and the Orfeó Català , which debuts in the cycle.
The million euros budget for this special edition –200,000 more than the current one– guarantees the presence of orchestras such as the Finnish Baroque, which will offer El MesÃas with Mireia Barrea and her Barcelona Ars Nova, or the Hungarian National Philharmonic, for which the maestro Jordi Francés will arrange the Poetic Waltzes by Granados. The SWR Stuttgart will not come this time with his director, Teodor Currentzis –who will offer Mozart’s Requiem with his Musicaeterna– but with Andrés Orozco-Estrada in Beethoven’s Pastoral and Stravisnki’s Rite of Spring.
Ãdám Fischer will continue with his comprehensive Mahler symphony together with the Düsseldorf Symphony (this time he plays the Fifth) and the French National will bring the new pianist and winner of the Tchaikovsky competition four years ago – “it reminds me of Daniil Trifonov†, says Prat– which is Alexandre Kantorow, playing Chopin and Prokofiev. Martha Argerich will be accompanied by the young Korean pianist Dong-heyk Lim and Maurizio Pollini will return, another pianist legend who, at 81, is still “in top formâ€, assures the president of Ibercamera.
From his beginnings with the Ibercamera cycle, Prat remembers the lesson that piano genius Sviatoslav Richter gave him on his first tour of Spain in 30 years. “He was literally a god. He didn’t have a manager, he didn’t talk on the phone, he didn’t watch television. The best thing was the fight on the first tour, while in Valencia. ‘You don’t know anything about anything, and only if you listen to me well will we move on : I don’t give a damn about those expensive hotels and money, because we owe what we do to some geniuses called Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert. And I warn you, the next time there is a mistake in the name of the composers in the program, you will give the concert'”.
That was solved with Prat arriving the day before in each city of the tour, to check the hand programs that were printed on the spot.
Looking back, a moment of special emotion for the president of Ibercamera would be the tribute to Mompou for what he managed to bring together Victoria de los Ãngeles and Alicia de Larrocha after a long time. It was January 1988 and they finished with Damunt de tu only les flores… “It’s an extraordinary event that represents a musical life in Barcelona that has disappeared”, he concludes.
