The Citadel of Jaca put the finishing touch to the 35th edition of the International Festival on the Camino de Santiago (FICS) this Friday with one of its great concerts. The Capella de Ministrers group, directed by Carles Magraner, closed the event with ‘Mediterrània. A sea of music‘, a proposal that covered the sounds of the Renaissance and the Baroque through the Mediterranean musical tradition.
The main protagonists of the programme were Claudio Monteverdi and Girolamo Frescobaldi, two essential figures in the transformation of European music between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Magraner highlighted Monteverdi’s role in the passage from the Renaissance to the Baroque and Frescobaldi’s innovative ability, especially in instrumental and keyboard music.
The performance was also closely linked to the thematic axis of this edition of the festival, dedicated in large part to the Crown of Aragon. For the director of Capella de Ministrers, that historical territory was an important space for exchange between cultures, languages and traditions, with a particularly relevant influence on the evolution of Mediterranean music.
On the stage of the Plaza de los Polvorines, the group was accompanied by Pino de Vittorio and Èlia Casanova, in a performance with which the organization ended an edition focused on the recovery and dissemination of musical heritage. Magraner also defended the validity of early music and its ability to bring universal emotions such as love, loss, hope or celebration to the public.
The concert thus put an end to a new edition of the International Festival on the Camino de Santiago, organized by the Diputación Provincial de Huesca, which has already reached 35 editions. Magraner claimed during his visit to Jaca the need to give continuity to this type of cultural projects and to strengthen collaboration between institutions, festivals, researchers and specialized training to preserve and disseminate this heritage.
