Back in Montreal for one night only, Jordi Savall will perform the North American premiere of The Routes of Slavery 1444–1888, at the Maison symphonique.
With this unique, historical project covering musical traditions from medieval Europe to negro spirituals, Jordi Savall pays moving homage to some 35 million men, women and children who were taken from their families and brought to the New World to be slaves. The Routes of Slavery sheds light on one of human history’s most painful and abhorrent chapters, still too little known to the general public.
The concert features living music drawn from the traditions of slaves from West Africa, Brazil, Mexico and the Caribbean, in dialogue with Hispanic and European musical forms, which were inspired in turn by the songs and dances of slaves, natives, and racial mixtures of all kinds. It represents the blending of African and American heritages with those of the European Renaissance and Baroque periods.
Through this emotional and surprisingly lively music, Savall evokes the history of these routes of slavery and the slave trade by calling on the memory of victims’ descendants, as well as Christian songs (Mateo Flecha El Viejo (La Negrina), Gaspar Fernandes (imss. de Puebla), Juan Garcia de Céspedes, Diego Durón, etc.), resulting from a culture of conquest and forced evangelization.
Jordi Savall will be accompanied by a number of guest musicians and singers from Africa (Mali, Madagascar and Morocco), South America (Argentina, Brazil and Venezuela), as well as Tembembe Ensamble Continuo (Mexico), a gospel choir from Nashville, The Fairfield Four, a narrator (Québécois artist whose name will be announced at a later date) and his usual partners, Hespèrion XXI and La Capella Reial de Catalunya.
