The Canary Islands Religious Music Festival is celebrating its 18th anniversary and we are doing so in the best possible way, presenting a new edition with top-level artistic proposals and maintaining the original philosophy regarding the repertoire, which is strictly religious.
Since the origins of this festival, there has been a strong commitment to local, national and international artistic values that have developed an outstanding artistic career in the field of religious music.
Eighteen years of experience consolidate this annual meeting, where the artistic excellence of the performers and the richness of the programmed repertoire make this edition an authentic celebration and a fundamental and indispensable event for Canarian, national and international society, which can enjoy unique architectural enclaves, such as the temples located in our archipelago, all of them religious heritage of cultural interest.
The 18th edition of the Canary Islands Religious Music Festival will feature 5 different programs and 20 concerts that will be distributed on 7 islands of the Canarian archipelago.
The Festival will be inaugurated with Stabat Mater by Joseph Haydn, an emblematic work of the religious repertoire, performed by the soloists: Tania Lorenzo (soprano), Gabriel Álvarez (tenor), Anna Tobella (mezzo-soprano) and Augusto Brito (baritone). The Mateo Guerra Chamber Choir and the Festival Orchestra will also participate, under the direction of Gregorio Gutiérrez. It is a work of great spiritual depth where the composer expresses, with absolute religious rigor, the tragedy and suffering experienced by the Virgin at the foot of the Cross. Of great beauty and with a serene and contained spirit, this program opens this edition inviting to intimate and personal reflection.
The duo formed by the Canarian pianist Esther Ropón and the Berlin pianist Ernst Surberg offer us a recital for two pianos focused on the mysticism of the composer Olivier Messiaen, who was marked by the desire for transcendence and by a deep religious faith.
Visions de l’Amen consists of seven ecstatic meditations for two pianos on biblical verses that span from Genesis to Revelation. A work of solid sonorities and a moving expressiveness with two identical instruments, where the contrast of two different timbres does not come into play, but rather the dialogue between the human being and the divinity.
The group Piacere dei Traversi, with its program Éxtasis a lo divino, música y poesía en torno a Santa Teresa de Jesús, proposes a female reading of the most spiritual Spanish musical Renaissance (Antonio de Cabezón, Tomás Luis de Victoria, Cristóbal de Morales, Francisco Guerrero,…), through its contextualization with the work of an illustrious creator of the Golden Age: Santa Teresa de Jesús (1515 – 1582), representative of the mystical literature that flourished in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries.
Musica Boscareccia puts the finishing touch to the program of the 18th edition of the Canary Islands Religious Music Festival. An attractive proposal as a selection of the 15 virtuous and complex Sonatas del Rosario by the composer H. I. Biber. A corpus of great diversity and expressiveness thanks to the use of all kinds of resources, providing originality and the masterful interpretation of the violinist Andoni Mercero together with the ensemble Musica Boscareccia.
As in each edition, we express our utmost gratitude to all the entities that have accompanied us during these eighteen years of experience. The Government of the Canary Islands, the Island Councils, town halls and other entities that with their support make it possible for the Canary Islands Religious Music Festival to be a historical and established event within the cultural and religious context of the Canarian archipelago.
A very special recognition to the Dioceses of Nivariense and Canarias, without whose esteemed collaboration and support our festival would be unfeasible.
We invite you to enjoy this new edition of the Festival, which we hope will be a source of inspiration and spiritual enrichment for all.
Thank you for your continued support.
The Festival Team
