The Manca Festival is in its 37th edition, a festival like no other. This year, although the edition is shorter, it remains no less prestigious.
The MANCA are demanding when it comes to the quality of the works in their program. This year, there are five locations: Biot, Carros, Menton, Vallauris, and, of course, Nice, where the Manca will offer the public high-quality performances.
Five emblematic locations in our Alpes-Maritimes department. Emblematic for their cultural and artistic dimension, emblematic for their history, and finally, emblematic for the artists who have lived there. Menton, with the Cocteau Museum, presents in a sort of OFF the ear that falls.
A whole symbolism with this organ of hearing, of listening; the ear decomposes to the rhythm of music. This ear is made of soap and will melt and disappear. Nice with the Marc Chagall Museum, the opera, and its conservatory. Carros and the Jacques Prévert Forum; Biot and the Fernand Léger Museum and finally Vallauris with “War and Peace,” Picasso’s major work. Pablo Picasso is, in a way, the link of this festival; from Menton to Vallauris, he is the beginning and the end.
The program is prestigious with 25 composers, 4 filmmakers, the Nice Philharmonic Orchestra, and designer artists. The highlights? Impossible to mention them without making others jealous; each event is a highlight, and from November 17 to 27, music, today’s music will be presented in six performances. The Ear of Menton being an installation, a sort of performance, a work destined to disappear.
The 2016 festival poster is full of symbolism, of messages sent to the public. Like a painting, one must decompose the canvas. The white bear being the Manca and the iceberg the National Center for Musical Creation (CIRM). The half-drowned score in the waves, a Titanic sinking with humanity as passengers, everything is conveyed in this poster. It is a very current image of climate change and its consequences.
We can only thank Mrs. Murielle Marland, the president of CIRM, for her words. This festival should satisfy the largest audience, music lovers, and especially film enthusiasts with the presentation of Abel Gance’s film: “J’Accuse.”
Contemporary music is too elitist and needs to be more commonplace, to be made accessible to the general public. Abel Gance’s film dates back to 1919, borrowing the title from Zola’s article; it is a plea against war and violence.
This restored film will be one of the great moments of this festival, especially on this centenary of the First World War. To conclude, we dare a pun: Don’t miss the Manca
Thierry Jan
