This year, the 27th Monte-Carlo Spring Arts Festival is evolving and now offers four major weekends! The festivities open this weekend with a unique journey into the heart of Turkish music, combining Baroque musicians, Turkish musicians, and the religious ceremonies of the Whirling Dervishes, as well as a program dedicated to the composer Gabriel Fauré, a genius of melody.
From Friday afternoon, Monaco will tune to the rhythm of music with the city interventions by Steve Villa-Massone, street pianist, the jazz company So What, and the Ensemble Printemps des Arts.
THE EVENT: THE TURQUERIES
… From the music of Constantinople to the Whirling Dervishes …
Founded in the 13th century, the tradition of the Mevlevi Whirling Dervishes illustrates a refined aspect of oriental mysticism. These Sufi brotherhoods, present in many countries around the Mediterranean, spin intoxicated by faith, wearing long robes that appear to stand still and rise when the motion sets in. The “Gate of Felicity,” allowing access to the third courtyard (reserved for festivities and campaign departures), is one of the finest places in the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul. True travel diaries, these two performances blending secular and sacred music will let audiences relive the peculiarities inherent to both Eastern and Western cultures in the Renaissance.
FRIDAY MARCH 18 | 8:30 PM | OCEANOGRAPHIC MUSEUM
Ensemble Doulce Memoire
Doulce Mémoire is above all about energy, a spirit of troupe, the pleasure of sharing and meeting with a common goal: to revisit the secular and sacred repertoire of the Renaissance. Made up of a close-knit team of instrumentalists and singers loyal to the ensemble, Doulce Mémoire performs at international festivals in Innsbruck, Saintes, Bath, Ambronay, or Boston, as well as in the courtyard of the UGC cinema in Paris, in a restaurant in Portugal, at 4000 meters altitude in the city of Quito, Ecuador, or precariously perched on a barge in the Tahiti lagoon.
A declared enemy of boredom, Doulce Mémoire constantly creates new and original concert forms and meets every challenge: from a show on a wagon, shot in 2000, to a shared concert with the great Uzbek singer Munnadjat Yulchieva, including the training of amateur choirs or young Bolivian Indians.
Ensemble Kudsi Erguner
Coming from a family of musicians, Kudsi Erguner had the opportunity to be in contact with many great musicians of the older generation, soaking up from them an authentic style reflecting centuries of musical culture. In Ottoman classical music, he is the only Turkish musician of his generation to have received direct instruction from his father, as dictated by oral tradition.
Additionally, having participated in many Sufi brotherhood gatherings, he has absorbed both their spiritual and musical teachings. His numerous concerts across the United States and Europe have contributed to the rediscovery of Ottoman classical music and Sufi music of Istanbul for Western audiences.
TURQUERIES – WHIRLING DERVISHES
Street interventions by Steve Villa-Massone, street pianist, So What company, and the Ensemble Printemps des Arts
SATURDAY MARCH 19 | 6:30 PM | PARKING DES PECHEURS
Meet the works
Lecture conference: Rumi or the dance of the spheres
by Leili ANVAR, lecturer
SATURDAY MARCH 19 | 8:30 PM | PARKING DES PECHEURS
The Whirling Dervishes of Turkey
Istanbul Music and Sema Group
Istanbul Musica and Sema Group was created by R. Hakan Talu and has borne this name since 1998. The group has performed over 150 times, in 12 countries and across 4 continents. The show comprises Turkish mystical music and the famous dance of the Whirling Dervishes.
Simultaneously, the musicians and soloists also participate in other musical formations from the rich Turkish repertoire. The ritual presented evokes a call to “human love,” “brotherhood,” and “tolerance” in association with the mysticism of Mevlana Celaleddin-i Rumi, who spoke of humanity exclaiming, “Come! Whoever you are, come!” The most important characteristic of this seven-hundred-year-old ritual is the union between the three main components of human nature: reason, love, and soul.
The ceremony, composed of 6 parts, ends with a reading from the Koran, a prayer resting the souls of all prophets and believers, from Sura Bakara 2, verse 115: “Where you look it is the face of God you see. He holds everything in his arms, he knows everything.”
PORTRAIT GABRIEL FAURÉ
As every year, the Spring Arts event steps outside its usual space to meet other audiences. This time in BEAULIEU, with two programs dedicated to the composer Gabriel Fauré, one of the most elegant artists of the Art Nouveau era in France. In his music, everything is graceful and curving, with an unsurpassed art of melody, whether sung by a voice or played by a violin. The work of the creator of “Pelleas and Melisande” will be showcased over two weekends (March 20 and 25).
SUNDAY MARCH 20 | 5:00 PM | CASINO – BEAULIEU
Meet the works
Lecture conference: Gabriel Fauré on the Côte d’Azur
by André PEYREGNE, director of the CNRR of Nice
SUNDAY MARCH 20 | 6:00 PM | CASINO – BEAULIEU
FAURE | Piano Quartet No. 1 in C minor FAURE | La Bonne Chanson
Ensemble Contraste
Geneviève Lourenceau, Maud Lovett, violins
Arnaud Thorette, viola
Antoine Pierlot, cello
Ensemble Contraste
Geneviève Lourenceau, Maud Lovett, violins
Arnaud Thorette, viola
Antoine Pierlot, cello
Johan Farjot, piano
Yann Dubost, double bass
“Contraste” consists of 4 classical musicians among the most promising of their generation who are redefining the boundaries of the classical concert. Energy, humor, sensitivity, and blending genres are the identity of their deliberately open approach, especially towards the voice. A crucible of new ideas and surprising experiences, the Ensemble Contraste is based on four main instruments: piano, violin, viola, and cello. The diversity and spontaneity of the artists composing this atypical ensemble allows for an original program ranging from classical music to tango, musical comedy, and contemporary creation.
Karine Deshayes, mezzo-soprano
Victoire de la musique Artiste lyrique 2011
Following her studies at the Conservatoire de Paris and obtaining a degree in musicology at the Sorbonne, Karine Deshayes joined the Lyon Opera troupe and then the Arts Florissants of William Christie. First Prize in the Golden Voices 2001, New Voices 2002, finalist in the Operalia Placido Domingo competition, she was nominated in the same year for “Revelation of the Year Vocal Artist” at the Victoires de la Musique Classique.
Since then, her career has taken an international dimension in places like New York, Barcelona, and the Paris Opera. A talented recitalist, she received the Charles Cros Academy Award for her recording of Fauré melodies with pianist Hélène Lucas (Zig Zag Territoires).
