Mim Juncà and Alicia Vogel exhibit at the 31st Schubertiade

The painter, draftsman and illustrator Mim Juncà from Banyoles and the multidisciplinary artist Alicia Vogel from Olot inaugurate the temporary exhibition Dialegs. Painting, music and heritage in the Romanesque canonical church of Santa María de Vilabertran as part of the 31st edition of the Vilabertran Schubertiada Festival.

The Department of Culture, once again, provides support by once again hosting the Canonical Festival through the aid program made available to the sector. This artistic proposal that unites three mainstays of culture: the visual arts, music and heritage. Diàlegs is a joint production of the Department of Culture and the Bòlit, Center for Contemporary Art in Girona. The subject and the title, as well as the pieces, were worked on this past spring between the two artists and the curator, Ingrid Guardiola.

As for the Festival's concert schedule, the soprano Erika Baikoff and the pianist James Baillieu will offer the opening recital of the 31st edition of the Vilabertran Schubertiada on August 16, which will close on August 27, as already is usual, the Quartet Casals. The festival offers a total of 19 concerts with 48 artists, 21 of which are in Vilabertran for the first time. The Schubertiade Festival will welcome established figures such as Matthias Goerne, Julia Kleiter, Christoph Prégardien, Katharina Konradi, Dorothea Röschmann and Andrè Schuen at the same time as welcoming debuts such as Erika Baikoff, Anna El-Khashem and Johannes Kammler. The Schubertiade will be preceded by four concerts focusing on Catalan talent between August 11 and 14 in Vilajuïga and Castelló d'Empúries.

New Impulse at the "Lied the future" academy

Among the novelties of this year's edition is the expansion of the Lied the future Academy, a program that grants scholarships to eight young European artists and reaffirms the commitment of the festival and the Banc de Sabadell Foundation to young talent. This firm commitment to the artists of the future is articulated in three pillars: the organization, throughout the year, of a lied course and master classes; mentoring in the form of accompaniment for four months to eight scholarship musicians from highly prestigious references (this year, soprano Dorothea Röschmann, pianist Wolfram Rieger and tenor Christoph Prégardien); and a concert scholarship for the selected students, with recitals in Vilabertran as part of the Schubertiada, as well as in Pals, Reus, Manlleu, Valls, Vic, the Cercle del Liceu and Life Victoria in Barcelona, Madrid, Segura de la Sierra and Salamanca.

Two Schubertiade concerts will present, as part of this program, the following duo formations: Katja Maderer with Amadeus Wiesensee and Jonas Müller with Anna Gebhardt on August 18; and Mireia Tarragó with Carmen Santamaría and Elionor Martínez with Olivia Zaugg on August 23.

On the other hand, the great Spanish pianist of today, Javier Perianes, will present on August 25 a program exclusively in Catalonia with works by Falla, Albéniz, Debussy and the Goyescas de Granados, the repertoire in which he excels the axis. The second piano recital included in the program avoids clichés: the Menorcan pianist Marco Mezquida, a sure value for all jazz fans and trusted by singers such as Sílvia Pérez Cruz, with whom he regularly collaborates. Mezquida, on August 19, will offer a solo piano program inspired by the world of Franz Schubert.

Finally, and as every year, the Casals Quartet will close the festival this year with a program that combines two absolute masterpieces: fragments of Bach's Lart de la fugue and the intense Quartet no. 14 Death and the Maiden by Schubert.

As for the cycle of conferences, this year three conferences are also scheduled and, as a novelty, "La previa" is presented, an informative space by the journalist and speaker Antoni Colomer, who, 45 minutes before each concert, will give 20 minutes the keys to the artists and the programs we will listen to that evening.