By now, any true Barcelona native knows that the 2023 edition of Primavera Sound will have two venues on two consecutive weekends; first, in the traditional Fòrum de Sant Adrià and then in the Ciudad del Rock in Arganda del Rey, Madrid. Despite our City Council's very cheap excuses, Primavera's split towards the capital of the kingdom (the beginning of a partial exile that could become definitive) is terrible news for the city. Even more so if, as you can imagine, this partial flight is not the result of chance, but of the neglect of Ada Colau's cultural team and the expertise of their Madrid counterparts. The operation has a name and surname; that of Andrea Levy, who has quietly plotted every possible facility for agents in the music industry to turn Madrid into one of Europe's festival capitals; Levy had the same determination in the musical sector and, as is evident, Madrid is already the capital of the genre in Spanish.
Let's go in parts, as the matter deserves to be told in adagio time. A few months ago, the PSOE administration approved law 14/2021, which modified Royal Decree 17/20, approving tax aid measures in favor of the cultural sector to face the economic and social impact of Covid. The text in question intensified the attribution of basic interest to culture, emphasizing "the service of culture as an essential duty and attribution." Far from taking advantage of the legal loophole to reactivate the music industry, both the Catalan and Barcelona administrations not only indulged in a siesta but, you will remember, focused the Covidian spotlight on the music industry with enormous malice, making the population fall into the absurd prejudice that Covid strolls more comfortably at a massive sound event than in a commuter train or metro car.
In recent years, organizers of festivals like Vida or Cruïlla have performed a thousand pirouettes that deserve the Creu de Sant Jordi for opening their doors while, I insist, the administration did everything possible to hinder them. While Catalonia and Barcelona played the card of purism (totally unjustified, in turn, because music festivals are one of the safest places on planet Earth), Madrid and other European cities dedicated themselves to applying the law and working. It is the most normal thing in the world that, tired of so much nonsense, the Primavera organizers have decided to split their soul and travel to the capital of Spain, and I can tell you with knowledge that right now there are many festival directors in Catalonia who are also negotiating to leave, tired of only being given objections and impediments at home. With all the pain in the world, I must say that they act righteously.
In recent years, organizers of festivals like Vida or Cruïlla have performed a thousand pirouettes that deserve the Creu de Sant Jordi for opening their doorsThe City Council has an insatiable voracity. Weeks ago we learned that they have also dedicated themselves to putting obstacles in the way of the Pedralbes festival(which in recent years had reactivated an absolutely dead area of the city and already had the definitive lineup and 30,000 tickets sold), citing complaints from neighbors who were bothered by the presence of the stages when walking their dog or doingrunning. I can understand the reservations of some fellow citizens, because we would all want to live in neighborhoods without tourists or noise, but it must be known that large-scale events cannot avoid a minimum impact on the city and that, if we continue with that puritanism (which, like all moral beatitude, is deeply conservative), Barcelona will not host relevant music festivals. The impact is not only an economic matter; it will mean that Barcelona is erased from the map of competitiveness.
Unfortunately, ours is not only an administration deeply ignorant of how the cultural industry works in the world, but also scandalously unaware of the consequences that Barcelona may suffer if its festivals go into exile. In the case of Primavera, the fact not only implies losing a festival, but also that the hiring of musicians does not have its gravitational center in our city. In turn, the disappearance of live music will also imply a colossal blow to our musical fabric. It is paradigmatic that the City Council manager, the culture vulture Jordi Martí, celebrated the irruption of Primavera in Madrid, stating that Barcelona was exporting to a "sub-venue". I hope his words are the result of cynicism, because if they are the result of ignorance, the future of our music industry looks the same as the presence of Catalan on Netflix.
I suppose that the city's cultural agents are not bothered by the fact that, in fact, many of Madrid's cultural centers are run by Catalans (or managers raised in Catalonia), such as Joan Matabosch (Teatro Real), Manolo Borja-Villel (Reina Sofía), Maribel López (ARCO) and a long etcetera of names to which, unfortunately, soon the directors, workers and musicians who have the temerity to try to make a living organizing festivals in Catalonia will be able to join. If there is intelligent life in the consistory, I hope that the City Council amends its disastrous musical policy and gets its act together urgently. Since we are there, if apart from intelligence, the desire to work is recovered, the administration should apply the same urgency to concert halls, a basic micro-fabric that is a source of food for festivals and a fundamental brand of our city.
Unfortunately, and as always happens, I fear that the reaction will come too late and that, as usual, the tribe will only excel in the art of mourning the absent. It will be one more on the list of things that, as always happens, are only our responsibility. One more of so many.
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