The 11th edition of the Valletta Baroque Festival is soon underway, with 36 concerts taking place between January 11 and 29.
The festival will be hosted at 20 different venues that include the Gran Salon of the Auberge de Provence, the Manoel Theatre and St John’s Co-Cathedral in Valletta.
Kenneth Zammit Tabona, the festival’s artistic director, stressed that the versatility of the baroque musical idiom is prevalent in this year’s edition, with multiple genres delivering a unique interpretation of early music.
“This is why the festival has rock and jazz in it, why it has 20th-century and contemporary orchestral compositions, and why it has special transcriptions for instruments that were not yet developed at the time that Bach, Vivaldi and Handel were composing their masterpieces,” he said.
Zammit Tabona said he believes this formula will serve to keep the audience intrigued, even though he admitted he is a purist at heart.
The Valletta Baroque Festival aims to maintain its connection with the musical genre and its concurrent baroque history.
Versatility of baroque is prevalent
The artistic director went on to say that having Valletta as an archetypical baroque capital city lends itself very aptly to such a music festival, saying that the festival built on the success of the previous editions, making it a desirable platform for prestigious artists from all over the world to perform in.
“The festival attracts patrons from all over Europe, who come to Malta to immerse themselves in the holistic baroque experience that the festival offers, which is what makes it unique. This is an integral part of our mission – to establish Malta as a European festival destination,” Aaron Zahra, chairman of Festivals Malta who produce the Baroque festival, said.
This will be the first festival since the start of the pandemic to have a full programme of events, as the past two editions were restricted due to COVID-19.
The current festival is, apart from some minor retouching, the one planned in 2019 for 2021, Zammit Tabona said.
“We have managed to keep the majority of the artists the same as originally planned and this baroque festival is as varied and as eclectic as ever,” he pointed out.
The Valletta Baroque Festival is produced by Festivals Malta in collaboration with Teatru Manoel and Visit Malta. Tickets and info are available on festivals.mt.