• The period of application for grants by AC/E, for the logistic expenses of having a Spanish artists in your festival or program, ends on 31st March. Check details below and discover a new proposal.
• The new artistic director of Fira Mediterrània is Jordi Fosas. Find below his profile and an interview with him. 
• Visa for Music opens the application period for artists. Check below for more open calls.

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Summary:  Jordi Fosas, new artistic director of Fira Mediterrània de Manresa – AC/E´s application for support is open – Mapamundi Música introduces… Entavía – Mini interview with festival director: Bożena Szota from Ethno Port Poznań (Poland) – New (and still) open calls – On tour

FLASH NEWS: DON KIPPER AND MELECH MECHAYA, 14TH APRIL IN COSLADA

Last WOMEX we have a super nice moment with Josh and Tim from the band from London Don Kipper. We are happy to bring them for our first collaboration, next April, on Sunday 14th, at the event Música en Primavera, by the city council of Coslada. They will play in a double program with our Portuguese combo Melech Mechaya. Details, here.

WELCOME JORDI FOSAS, NEW ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF FIRA MEDITERRÀNIA DE MANRESA 

I have known the Fira Mediterrània from some of its possible viewpoints, as an artist, as a programmer and also as a collaborator. These last three years we have collaborated with the Fira in the development of the Premi Delfí Colomé, an initiative that we have promoted from the ÉSdansa Festival to promote new dance projects created from the traditional roots.
I thought that I could contribute my experience to the artistic direction of the Fira and for that reason I presented myself to the call.

MM – The Fira Mediterrània has an international recognition as a fair where exciting proposals in the different disciplines that it includes are always discovered. How are you guys going to face this stage with you in the direction? Are you going to change something, are you going to give more weight to any subjects, any change of format, locations…?

JF – The Fira Mediterrània has done a good work in these more than twenty years of trajectory. For this reason, we will continue building from the bridges already drawn by the previous directors. I believe that the projects are enriched and strengthened when a new director contributes from the experience of the previous directors.

In the next years we will try to reinforce our brand positioning to help us articulate a circuit and generate discourse, essential elements to achieve our goal: market for proposals with traditional roots. We want to normalize that proposals that work from the traditional root are programmed.

The basic principles or strategic lines that we will develop have the objective of achieving a creative, reflective, complicit, committed and unique Fira, and we will do it in a 360 approach, that is to say, all the time and looking for complicities. We will work from three keys:
• weaving, that is, promoting and helping new creations and productions and making intersections and pairings between creators and popular culture;
• drawing packages of meaning that help the public and professionals to visualize creative realities,
• and getting a Fira in first person from the formats that generate new forms of participation and educational projects.

JF – At Fira Mediterrània we want to show a tradition with no complexes, that works in the present and in excellence and this will be our criterion to draw the Fira’s programming. We conceive a Fira that works intersections with the 360 degrees of the tradition, from the heritage and all that corpus of testimonies that form the cultural heritage of society, passing through the entities of popular culture that connect this heritage with their society, until reaching the professional sector that creates from this tradition. We are especially interested in the intersections, relationships and exchanges between all these agents, especially, how artists and professional companies drink from heritage, tradition and popular culture.

MM – What will be the balance in number of shows, in terms of concerts and other traditional culture shows?

JF – We will continue backing an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary Fira that gathers proposals from all the performing arts, from theater, dance, circus, visual arts, music … whether they are indoors or outdoors and in any of their formats. Our axis of programming is the traditional Mediterranean tradition in any discipline and format and we do not set a percentage for each of them. We will follow approximately the criteria that have been considered in recent editions.

MM – In recent years, the Fira has included proposals from outside the cultural field of the Mediterranean. Will this line be maintained?

JF – Yes, we will continue to program exceptional international proposals that stimulate the work of our artists and help us articulate discourse. We will focus on concrete proposals, but also on cities, territories, cultures … to see how the dialogue between tradition and contemporaneity works. We will work on it within the Fira’s State and International Action Plan. We will show and see other ecosystems, to see how a territory a structure, a project… is organized, works and creates.

Pictures: Jordi Fosas’s Facebook profile; Llotja profesional, by Anna Brugués.

DO YOU WANT A SPANISH ARTIST IN YOUR PROGRAM? AC/E’S CALL FOR SUPPORT IS OPEN DURING MARCH

Acción Cultural Española (AC/E) is a public entity dedicated to promoting the culture and heritage of Spain. In March they open the call to request support for the logistic expensesrelated to Spanish artists and experts in cultural issues, for events abroad taking place in the second half of the year.

The application must be done by the foreign institution/programmer and Mapamundi Música has supported some clients in previous editions to fullfill the procedure, that in fact is not difficult. The results are usually published quite soon (around the 3rd week of April).

We can offer you our band Vigüela (in the picture) and Entavía. Check the next news, at the Mapamundi Música introduces….

MAPAMUNDI MÚSICA INTRODUCES…

Entavía, from Salamanca province, in Castilla y León community 
As a proffesional working with folk music since 2002, I think I am very discriminating about the proposals, even more if they come from my own country. We have had great experiences with Spanish bands, like El Naán, with whom we are not working now but we keep a deep friendship and mutual admiration. Apart of them and our beloved Vigüela and associated acts, I don’t use to get often excited enough to start a collaboration to promote a Spanish folk band. It has to be very very special.

And… I first payed attention to this band, Entavía, in this videoclip for a panaderas style song with a poem written in 1931 by Miguel de Unamuno. It was like a premonition to a catastrophe that would happen some years after: the breaking down of the dam of Ribadelago, in 1959, that killed 144 of the villagers, of which only 28 bodies where found.

Entavía puts music to this thrilling poem in a tribute to the victims and a claim for the unfair treatment that Franco’s government gave to the survivors.

Last Saturday I attended their concert in Madrid. It was in a little classroom in the downtown. Copla, ajechao, son jarocho, panaderas… in a concert full of freshness and fun made the evening unforgettable. You’ll hear more about them. In the meantime, check some snippets in these videos: 

CURRENT AND FUTURE CHALLENGES FOR FESTIVALS 

If you haven´t read them, you can find the previous interviews clicking on the names: 
Michal Schmidt (Folk Holidays, CZ) – Jun-Lin Yeoh (Rainforest WMF, MY) – Luis Lles (Pirineos Sur, ES) – Amitava Bhattacharya (Sur Jahan, IN) – Nicolas Ribalet (Sukiyaki Meets the World, JP) – Sergio Zaera (Poborina Folk, ES) – Per Idar Almås (Førdefestivalen, NO)

 

MINI INTERVIEW WITH BOŻENA SZOTA FROM ETHNO PORT POZNAŃ

Over the four days of the festival, in the Polish city of Poznań hosts concerts, dance parties, performances, interdisciplinary actions, workshops, film screenings and meetings for analysis and reflection about the current and future challenges in our societies. 

MM – What do you search in an artist when you program? 
BS – We are searching authenticity and emotional truth, high artistic quality, original or masterful approach to traditional music

MM – Which are the global objectives of your festival?
BS – We invite artists from all, even the most distant parts of the world. And during the events accompanying the festival (films, discussions, lectures) we focus on the global issues such as migration, cultural exchange or problems with building a sense of identity in a world of global exchange

MM – What are the most complicated or difficult issues to deal with in your festival? 
BS – Modern forms of communication make it more easier to overcome organizational and logistic barriers. Differences in visas and tax regulations may be a problem.

MM – Which are currently the main challenges for this kind of cultural proposals like yours? 
BS – Negating the need for intercultural exchange related to the increase of xenophobic attitudes, lack of support from the Ministry of Culture and weak interest of potential sponsors of the event.

MM – In one sentence, summarize the reason/s to go to your festival. 
BS – High quality of program proposals and their diversity as well as unique atmosphere built by the community festival audience.

Picture: one of Bożena’s Facebook profile pictures

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