The 48 SEMANA DE MÚSICA RELIGIOSA DE CUENCA has literature, the Mystics and spiritual music as its programme baseline. This is in keeping with the SMR tradition to maintain a dialogue between Early and Contemporary music.  This year's SMR revolves around the renewal of this repertoire with the premiere of two commissioned works, the recovery of our historic musical heritage, and the celebration of George Frideric Handel and Franz Joseph Haydn’s anniversaries. The SMR will bring to Cuenca renowned soloists and ensembles and will be offering 25 concerts taking place in 10 different venues in the city and its surroundings.

Musical Heritage
With the restoration of the Órgano del Evangelio (Gospel Organ) by the Desmottes brothers, the entire project for the restoration of the Baroque organs in Cuenca Cathedral has been accomplished and will be celebrated in the inaugural concert.

Another concert takes place at the Uclés Monastery, situated in the outskirts of the city, where the music collection found at the monastery’s Library is being catalogued.

To commemorate Franz Joseph Haydn’s bicentenary, we will also have the opportunity to listen to Jaques Ogg interpreting the piano version of “Las siete últimas palabras de Cristo en la Cruz” (The Seven Last Sayings of Jesus on the Cross), from an original manuscript found at the Poor Clare's Convent in Ávila. This version will be followed by the corresponding liturgical chants, performed by the Alfonso X Gregorian Choir and its conductor Luis Lozano.

Commissioned works
The Trio Arbós will also present another commissioned work: a Piano Trio by the Valencian composer Miguel Gálvez Taroncher (*1974).

Once again this year's Festival has its Contemporary Music Programme well to the forefront with works by the composers Arnold Schoenberg, Olivier Messiaen, John Cage, Peter Eötvos, George Crumb, Ian Wilson or Sara Mínguez and Juanjo Guillem, among others.

Great productions
Religious music places the text in first place and normally requires a soloist, a choir and orchestral ensemble in concert. So as to provide this repertoire with maximum historical accuracy the 48 SMR offers a large number of programmes requiring simply the best in production.

The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, conducted by Mark Padmore will perform a rather interesting version St Matthew’s Passion, BWV 244 in which the soloists themselves also assume the role of the choir. (Concert No. 3)

It is with great honour that the festival welcomes the soloists Sandrine Piau and Christoph Prégardien with the ensembles Ars Nova Copenhagen and Concerto Copenhagen, conducted by Kenneth Weiss. They will offer us a rather unknown work which is George Frideric Handel’s Passion, based on a libretto by Barthold Heinrich Brockes (Concert No. 7).

In concert number 11, we will also be able to hear Handel’s Oratorio Theodora HWV 68, with the ensembles Accentus and Il Complesso Barocco, conducted by Alan Curtis. Laurence Equilbey's choir Accentus also participates in two other concerts at the SMR: first, a remarkable monographic programme (Concert No. 15) with the pianist Brigitte Engerer around the composer Franz Liszt, and once again at the festival's closing concert.

Fabio Biondi will also be performing at three different concerts: as a soloist, with Kenneth Weiss (Concert No. 19), and on two other occasions conducting his orchestra Europa Galante. Together with the Rundfunkchor Berlin and the soloists Sophie Daneman, Nathalie Stutzmann, Filippo Adami, and David Wilson Johnson, he will interpret Franz Joseph Haydn’s Stabat Mater Hob. XX-bis (Concert No. 14). And at concert number 9 we will be able to hear the Oratorio “Faraone Sommerso” by Nicola Fago (1677-1745).

Les Talens Lyriques with their conductor Christophe Rousset will perform “Leçons de Ténèbres” by Marc-Antoine Charpentier on the three consecutive days of Holy Week they were composed for: Wednesday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday.

Also relevant at this year's SMR is the presence of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra who will perform under the baton of its new conductor Andris Nelson on Good Friday. On the following day, it will offer us the premiere of Jonathan Harvey's work together with the Berlin Rundfunkchor, conducted by Simon Halsey.

One year on, the Joven Orquesta Nacional de España (Spanish National Youth Orchestra) attends the SMR, this time with Christian Zacharias as conductor. He will not only perform as a soloist with a Haydn-Scarlatti recital, but he will also conduct Franz Schubert’s Symphony No. 8 in b minor, D 759, “Incomplete”, and his Mass No. 6 in B flat major, D 950, at the closing concert on Easter Sunday at 19.00.

The ensembles Neopercusión, Tenebrae, Gilles Binchois, Micrologus, the Grupo Alfonso X “El Sabio”, the Gabrieli Consort, and the Trio Arbós will also perform highly specialised and very ambitious programmes.

Conferences: “Mystics, Literature and Music”
The “Mystics, Literature and Music” study sessions are a complement to this year's concert programme. This series of conferences from Monday of Holy Week to Wednesday will discuss Mystical Literature and its impact on music; they will pay special attention to the work of Saint John of the Cross. Reflections upon these will be mirrored in three chamber music concerts and five liturgies celebrated in the cathedral and interpreted by Schola Antiqua.

The venues
Lastly, it is important to reflect upon the importance of the marvellous spaces that Cuenca, a World Heritage Site, can offer. Its architectural beauty is often associated with intense religious spirituality. Our venues this year are. the cathedral, the Fundación Antonio Pérez, the Church of La Merced, the Cathedral Chapterhouse, Arcas Church, Church of San Miguel and the church of the Monastery of the Immaculate Conception (Concepción Franciscana). This year, the festival also has a concert taking place at Uclés Monastery, a few kilometres outside the city of Cuenca.

Pilar Tomás
Artistic Director