Festival of Pollença

The Festival of Pollença was founded in 1962 thanks to the initiative of the distinguished English violinist Philip Newman and has kept going until today under the artistic direction of several significant figures: violinists Philip Newman and Eugen Prokop, baritone Joan Pons and composer Joan Valent. Since 2016, the Festival has been overseen by an artistic committee, and from 2020, it will be managed with the assistance of a leading advisor, who will help with matters relating to the Festival’s programming and general management.

Over the last sixty years, the Festival’s international prestige has been cemented, quickly becoming one of the most unmissable events of the summer, both for locals and visitors who wish to enjoy music in a wide variety of forms and expressions.

More than eight hundred first-class artists have contributed to the history of this event, with a spectrum of nationalities and styles, including the USSR Radio Symphony Orchestra, the National Orchestra of France, the Pittsburgh Symphony, Lord Yehudi Menuhin, Mtislav Rostropóvich, Lorin Maazel, Mischa Maisky, Ara Malikian, Maria Joao Pires, Monserrat Caballé, Ainhoa Arteta, José Mercé, Ravi Shankar, Goran Bregovic, Roger Hodson, Michael Nyman, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Nelson Freire, the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra & Choir and the London Philharmonic Orchestra, to name just a few of the pre-eminent names to have performed at the festival.

The Festival, as a living organism, has been developed to this day seeking to offer the public an image of constant improvement and adapting to the times. Initially with a more “classical” conception of the repertoire and chamber music until it accommodated different artistic manifestations from other areas of interest, opening the door to experimentation and the search for other ways of approaching other types of music.

All this as a sign of the festival’s objective of broadening its horizons without losing sight of the fact that the wide range offered is of extraordinary quality and artistic excellence. In this way, the Festival has been offering a magnificent cultural oasis for six decades, not only to the “pollencins” and residents who decided to establish their residence in the municipality, but also to visitors who decide to bet on Pollença as a tourist destination. quality.

Traditionally, it has been held during summer nights, in the incomparable setting of the old cloister of Sant Domingo convent, with an exquisite and demanding program that aims to bring the different artistic strands of classical music to the public.