XVII WEST COAST - FESTIVAL MÚSICA ANTIGA DE OEIRAS 2024

The 17th edition of the West Coast - Oeiras Early Music Festival has an intense program with the key idea: 'Counterpoints'; East-West cultural parallels; the coexistence of contemporary writing with some of the strictest compositional techniques of the Baroque period; the Iberian musical worlds of the Renaissance and Mannerism and transalpine contrapuntal writing, whether in obsessive writing. There are also instrumental 'confrontations', some more explosive artistically, others more unusual; and modern premieres of contemporary compositions for ancient instruments.
The festival's program returns to the 'golden' repertoires of Portuguese Early Music, privileging, as always, the work of historical reconstitution by specialized groups, such as the Ensemble Arte Mínima, directed by Pedro Sousa Silva, which opens the festival with a varied program of works by Vicente Lusitano, a Portuguese composer of African origin who in the 15th century gained a remarkable reputation in Rome and in the musical world of the Counter-Reformation. In counterpoint to this program, the Bando do Surunyo, a group directed by Hugo Sanches, presents us with a very lively profane program of Vilancicos, Tonos and Cantatas from the 16th and 17th centuries.

Still within the historical period of the 16th and 17th centuries, the Ensemble Flores de Mvsica - Orquestra Renascentista presents the programme 'Niña Era La Infanta', which celebrates the 450th anniversary of the meeting of two civilizations, the Japanese and the European, when the Japanese Embassy arrived in Portugal in 1574. The Ensemble Flores de Mvsica has already presented this program in several cities in Japan, Tokyo, Yokkaichi and Nagoya, and this celebration closes the 17th edition of West Coast.

Of the other concerts, the 'Sempre Cânone' program stands out, where we hear the obsessive but wonderful counterpoint of Telemann's canons, in parallel with the premieres of contemporary works for antique instruments, a very particular project of the Andromedra Duo. At the concert on November 8, we will hear an unusual dialog between the mandolin and the harpsichord, with the Duo 'Em Forma de Pera', which explores more unknown repertoires that cover a broader historical period. From the period of the French Revolution, pianist Michio O'Hara and harpsichordist João Janeiro present a late-Seventies program of dialogue-collaboration between the two instruments.

Parallel to the concerts, as always, the festival will maintain its expected pedagogical and audience-attracting component, with workshops, meetings with conservatoire students and the presentation of recently released CDs dedicated to the dissemination of Portuguese Early Music.  The box office will be managed by the BOL platform.