EFRÉN LÓPEZ oud, hurdy-gurdy, medieval lute, citole, guittern, hammered & plucked psaltery, trompa marina, anafil, rabab, harp

Multiinstrumentalist, founder of L’Ham de Foc, Aman Aman and Sabir, collaborator with many other musicians and groups in the fields of Early and roots music. (Capella de Ministrers, Maria Lafitte, Estampie, Oni Wytars, Miquel Gil, Ross Daly…). Efrén approaches the Medieval repertory by studying the various types of modal music under the tutelage of teachers from Greece, Turkey, Afghanistan and India (Ross Daly, Necati Çelik, Daud Khan, Mohammed Rahim Khusnawaz, Yurdal Tokcan, Erol Parlak, Mehmet Erenler…). His arrangements, historically based on Medieval music, imbue the selected repertory with a vibrant, dynamic character.

MIRIAM ENCINAS recorders, fiddle, bendir, riq

Born in the heart of a family of musicians, Miriam was surrounded by popular music from a very early age, with groups like Els Trobadors and L’Arc en el Cel. She would later initiate her studies of the recorder, percussion and viola da gamba. Her innate musicality combines the fresh outlook of a performer brought up in an environment of traditional music with the rigour and precision of her academic training. Some of the groups she has collaborated with are: Joi de Trobar, Els Trobadors, L’Ham de Foc, Lidia Pujol and Ensemble l’Albera.

LAIA PUIG recorders, bagpipes, shawn

Another case of academic training combined with musical roots. Laia contributes the sound of the most powerful wind instruments to the group. Her musical history proves her a highly flexible musician – she has a wide range of experience in the fields of contemporary, traditional and Early music. Carles Santos, L’Ham de Foc, Aljub or Tresmall are some of the groups she has worked with. She studied dolçaina with Pau Puig, Alejandro Blay and Xavier Richart, and recorder with David Antich.

IVÁN LÓPEZ voice

This is the first non-rock project for this compulsively creative multi-instrumentalist and singer. His career as a performer and arranger (The X, Soledad Gimenez, Presuntos Implicados) is added to his work as a composer for film and designer. His androgynous, unusual voice of incredible range gives a distinctive quality and credibility to the Medieval repertory which is usually performed by singers with classical training.

PEDRAM KHAVARZAMINI tombak

He learned to play the Tombak alongside to tombak Masters Kamyar Mohabbat and Bahman Rajabi. Talented student, he will perform in public with Bahman Rajabi, duet for Tombak, and will help him to write his method  for tombak. He has founded his own percussion tombak group, 'Varashan'. Pedram has performed concerts with Kayhan Kalhor, Georgi Petrov, Ross Daly, Dhruba Ghosh, Partha S. Mukherjee, Hamid Khabazi, Stelios Petrakis, Vassilis Stavrakakis, Giorgos Xylouris, Kelly Thoma, Habil Aliev, Mohammed R. Khushnawaz, Dariush Talai, Ballake Sissoko, Zohar Fresco... His advanced technique and his musicale influences (Persian, Indian, Turkish...) give him a unique way to play tombak. Pedram is considered to be one of the most brilliant artists from the new generation of Persian classical music.

OSVALDO JORGE tabla, kanjira, ghatam, frame drums

L'ALMODÍ CHAMBER CHOIR

Ruth González i Queralt, Amparo Maiques Fernández, Carla García Mayer, Adriana García Mayer

 MOTZ E SO Music of the Occitan and Catalan troubadours of the 12th and 13th Centuries

Occitan poetry shone with great splendour in the 12th and 13th centuries. It represented a vast artistic and social movement which, due to the profound changes in the way relationships between man and woman were perceived, created one of the most important phenomena in the history of European civilisation. Love, in the romantic sense of the word, has not always existed – it was invented by the troubadours. The preferred literary genres included the canso – poems about courtly love, and the sirventes – moral or political satires. Other important genres were the tenso, a debate between two or more speakers of contrasting opinion; the alba where two lovers who have spent the night together are awoken by a guard; the pastorella in which a knight attempts to seduce a shepherdess; and the planh – lamenting the death of a noble or outstanding personage. Arrangement of works from Berenguer de Palou, Raimon de Miraval and Peire Cardenal among others.

ISTAMPITTA Instrumental medieval dances

Dance, a favourite pastime in the Middle Ages, clearly required some form of musical accompaniment. In 13th Century France, a copy was made of a collection known as the “Chansonnier du Roi”, in which a series of royal dances and estampies are to be found. This is the oldest known example of Western instrumental dance music. All the dances are monophonic and consist of various repeated sections or punctia. Another collection is also found in an anonymous manuscript from 14th century Tuscany, preserved in London. In it are melodies such as the Lamento di Tristan and La Rotta, or La Manfredina and La Rotta, pieces of vital importance to the development of instrumental dance music, as they are the earliest preserved evidence that a slow dance would be linked to a faster one which showed clear rhythmic and melodic coherence with the first.

 DOMINA The Feminine universe of the Middle Ages (in collaboraton with the female voices of the Almodí Chamber Choir)

In no society or time is it a neutral phenomenon or merely “natural” categorization to be born male or female. Much to the contrary, ones conditioning is moulded by the society one is the product of.
Musically speaking, we can approach the complex vision held in the Middle Ages of femininity from a variety of viewpoints. The troubadours had their image of woman as a perfect ideal and unquestionable focus of fin’amor, or as a rival in the dialectic games of the tenso or pastorella. These views are in stark contrast to those of the clergy, who saw woman as either a temptress and sinner by nature, or as the creator of life as represented in the figure of the Virgin Mary. They also contrast with the view of woman as a mere object of pleasure, seen by the Goliard authors of Carmina Burana. Of course, we can enjoy the works of Medieval female composers and poets, from the mysticism of Hildegard von Bingen through to the sensuality of the female Troubadours Beatriz de Dia or Blanca de Castilla.

Dossier (PDF)