In the year that marks the 250^th anniversary of the birth of Ludwig van ‎Beethoven (Bonn, 1770 – Vienna, 1827), L’Auditori presents the Beethoven250 Festival, a ‎season inspired by this German genius’ prolific musical legacy.‎
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The programme will start with an extraordinary Beethoven Marathon in which leading ‎Catalan artists will perform 14 hours of uninterrupted chamber music by the German ‎composer. This will include all his piano trios, violin and piano sonatas and cello and piano ‎sonatas, featuring artists such as the Ludwig Trio, Vera and Claudio Martínez Mehner, Miguel ‎Colom, Arnau Tomàs, Enrique Bagaría, Josep Colomer and Trio Fortuny, among others.‎
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The Beethoven Marathon, which is free to attend, will take place this coming Saturday, 11 ‎January in L’Auditori’s Sala 2 Oriol Martorell. Additionally, Sala 3 Tete Montoliu will be ‎showing 9 Beet Stretch during the whole of Saturday, also with free admission. This is a ‎sound installation in which the Scandinavian artist Leif Inge stretches out Beethoven’s Ninth ‎Symphony to last 24 hours and which will also be streamed on L’Auditori’s website.‎
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In addition to the Beethoven Marathon, the Chamber Music season will welcome, as part of ‎the Beethoven250 Festival, pianists Evgeny Kissin, who will perform a programme exclusively ‎devoted to Beethoven’s sonatas and variations, and Nikolai Lugansky, who will be returning ‎to L’Auditori in a co-production with BCN Clàssics. The Calidore String Quartet, accompanied ‎by oboist Cristina Gómez Godoy, and the Barragán-Soltani-Floristán Trio will also take part in ‎this celebration of Beethoven.‎

At the Beethoven250 Festival, the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra will perform a large part of ‎Beethoven’s symphonic works under the batons of Kazushi Ono, Jan Willem de Vriend and ‎Rudolf Buchbinder. These will include his symphonies, the Violin Concerto, the Triple ‎Concerto for Violin, Cello and Piano, and the complete piano concertos. These works will be ‎performed by renowned soloists Alisa Weilerstein, María Dueñas, Guy Braunstein and ‎Michaela Kaune, along with others. The OBC will also perform outside L’Auditori, ‎accompanied by the Orfeó Català, in a special concert at the Palau de la Música.‎
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The Barcelona Symphony Band will perform the full set of Beethoven’s incidental musical ‎pieces for the stage performance of Goethe’s play Egmont. It will be narrated by the actor ‎Alex Casanovas.‎
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As far as orchestra music is concerned, L’Auditori will welcome the Royal Philharmonic ‎Orchestra, conducted by Pinchas Zukerman, in a joint production with Ibercamera.‎
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The Jazz Sessions explore the Beethoven250 Festival with Xavi Torres, one of the most ‎acclaimed jazz musicians on the Catalan music scene. L’Auditori has decided to mark this ‎anniversary by commissioning him to rework some of the composer’s sonatas in trio format. ‎With great respect for the original work, Torres will make it his own and explain it to us ‎through the rhythmic exuberance, timbric richness and textural depth that characterise his ‎language.‎
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As part of the Early Music season, Jordi Savall will conclude the performance of Beethoven’s ‎complete symphonies with Le Concert des Nations, offering a performance with period ‎techniques and instruments in contrast to the OBC’s modern symphonic approach to ‎Beethoven’s work. Next season, there will also be the chance to enjoy the opera Fidelio in ‎concert and a special performance by the Cuarteto Casals during the OBC season.‎
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The Sampler Series will include projects based on the figure of Beethoven: David Lang’s ‎opera prisoner of the state, which is a re-imagining of the original libretto of Fidelio – jointly ‎commissioned with institutions of the calibre of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra – and ‎the premiere of a work by sound artist Christine Sun Kim – who was born deaf – presented ‎by Ensemble Contrechamps, as well as Leif Inge’s installation work which you can experience ‎this Saturday.‎
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In the Escenes season, sisters Clara and Ariadna Peya will present TOC SUITE No. 6, a ‎reflection on the isolation of various groups, such as people with mental disorders or ‎impaired hearing, and their perception of art and reality.‎
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L’Auditori’s Servei Educatiu (Education Service) will also be present during the Beethoven250 ‎Festival with the family concert ZOOM, featuring the youngest members of the National ‎Youth Orchestra of Catalonia conducted by Manel Valdivieso, and with choreography and ‎stage direction by Cesc Gelabert. This is a show in which Gelabert challenges the young ‎performers’ technical abilities and their imagination with music by Britten, Stravinsky, Toldrà, ‎Rameau and, of course, Beethoven, showcasing the musicians, their movements and their ‎emotions.‎


‎Rethinking Beethoven: The Beethoven250 Festival at the Museu de la Música ‎‎‎
Jonathan Brown, violinist and professor, will present a series of three conversations with ‎dancer and choreographer Cesc Gelabert, sommelier Josep Roca and philosopher Eulàlia ‎Bosch.‎
Rethinking Beethoven will bring together these three eminent figures from the cultural and ‎creative world to talk about the character of the German composer, in dialogue at the Museu ‎de la Música with the Cuarteto Casals violinist. ‎
Furthermore, the Museu de la Música is preparing the exhibition “Muzio Clementi, The ‎Father of the Pianoforte” which, in addition to the life and work of this great musician who ‎was key to the history of the piano, retraces his relationship with Beethoven. The exhibition ‎will be open from 13 February to 12 April.‎

‎An Accessible Festival‎
The Beethoven250 Festival is committed to providing accessibility services for most of the ‎festival’s events and adapting them to meet their artistic and theatrical characteristics. This ‎idea was inspired by Beethoven’s deafness and his own personal perception of art.‎
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During the festival, there will be subtitling, sign language interpreters and a hearing loop for ‎people with impaired hearing and audio descriptions and programmes in Braille for blind and ‎visually-impaired people. In addition, the areas reserved for wheelchair users will be ‎increased. The programmes will be designed for optimum legibility, and pictograms will be ‎used to indicate which services are available at each concert.‎
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L’Auditori wants to take another step towards universal accessibility and create a cultural ‎space for everyone. For this reason, it is working (among other projects) on the creation of ‎two relaxation areas for people with special needs. These will be located in the lobbies of ‎Sala 1 Pau Casals and Sala 2 Oriol Martorell.‎
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This project has been co-funded (65%) by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) ‎through the Interreg V-A Spain-France-Andorra cooperation programme (POCTEFA 2014-‎‎2020). The aim of POCTEFA is to strengthen the economic and social integration in the ‎Spanish, French and Andorran border area. It focuses on carrying out cross-border economic, ‎social and environmental actions by means of joint strategies to achieve sustainable ‎territorial development.‎

‎Download materials‎
‎Beethoven Festival Programme‎

‎Beethoven Marathon Programme‎

‎Beethoven250 Festival Image‎