Arvo Pärt will come for the first time to Mexico, confirms the FIC

He will be one of the stellar figures of the 40th Festival Cervantino, La Jornada said.

The artistic and cultural meeting has a budget of 72.6 million pesos, informs the Director Lidia Camacho. Three thousand and fifteen artists from 29 countries will be taking part.

By Ángel Vargas


As La Jornada said in its edition on the 29th of February, the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt will visit Mexico for the first time in October. He will be one of the major figures of the commemorative version on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the Festival International Cervantino Festival (FIC).

This was confirmed yesterday by the Director of the cultural and artistic event, Lidia Camacho, during the presentation of the official program, which will take place from 3rd to the 21st of October in the city of Guanajuato.

Known as one of the most important living musicians in the world, Arvo Pärt will attend the concert together with the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir and the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra at the Teatro Juarez, who will play Pärt’s compositions on the 19th of October.

Another important presence of the international sound scene will be the Italian orchestra conductor Riccardo Muti, who will conduct the Chicago Symphony, one of the most prestigious groups in the world, with a program that will include works by Johannes Brahms, Felix Mendelssohn and Giuseppe Verdi.

Music, in its different versions (ancient, contemporary, symphonic, chamber and popular), will be the most prominent segment in the special program of the next Festival Internacional Cervantino, both due to its numbers and artists.

We only have to make notice of the fact that Arvo Pärt has agreed to visit the country, where in addition to Guanajuato, he will be presented also at the Palace of Fine Arts, probably on the 20th of October.

This can be considered beforehand as one of the most important events of 2012 at the national level of concert music. Not only because this Estonian is a “living legend” of world sound art, but also because he hardly accepts to leave his home in Berlin, Germany, where spends much of the time researching and writing, almost like a hermit.

In the same way, there will be other internationally relevant well-known soloists in the musical segment of the FIC, among which outstands the presentation in the country of the American pianist Murray Perahia, who has gained popularity with his interpretations of Brahms, Schumann and Beethoven.

Also stand out French pianist François Chaplin, well-known for its performances of the works of Claude Debussy; Italian violinist Fabio Biondi, specialized in Baroque music; and Mexican tenor Javier Camarena, already consolidated in the main opera theaters of the world.

Groups and ensembles include the Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra, the cameratas of Salzburg and Berne, as well as the Canadians Les Violons du Roy. The design of the commemorative program of the 40th anniversary of the FIC seeks to maintain a balance between tradition and the avant-garde, with proposals and events for different types of public, as stated during the event undertaken yesterday at noon in the Palace of Fine Arts.

As every year, the festival is represented in all artistic expressions: opera, dance, theatre, visual arts and cinema, also activities for children and young people and of academic type.

In total, there will be three million and fifteen artists from 29 nations participating in the FIC, among them Poland, Austria and Switzerland as guest of honor countries. Sinaloa is the Mexican entity guest of honor. There will be 281 performances, distributed in 55 forums.

For all this, according to Lidia Camacho, an overall budget of 72.6 million pesos will be allocated. According to the Governor of Guanajuato, Héctor López Santillana, it is estimated that the city of Guanajuato will receive nearly 149 thousand visitors and more than 36 thousand tourists from Mexico and other parts of the world on the occasion of the event.

The 40th edition of the Festival Internacional Cervantino will be opened with the Rock Jazz Chopin show, from Poland, in the Alhóndiga de Granaditas, where it will also take place the closing ceremony with a popular concert by the Sinaloa Symphony Orchestra of Arts and the original band El Limón.

The anniversaries of events that will be commemorated in the Cervantine program include the centennials of José Pablo Moncayo, Carlos Guastavino and Xavier Montsalvatge; the 80 years of the painter Vicente Rojo, the 60th anniversary of Los entremeses Cervantinos, and the half-century career of singer Tania Libertad.

During the formal ceremony at the Palace of Fine Arts,  the FIC was referred as the most important multidisciplinary festival in America and even in Latin America and also one of the five most relevant worldwide.