Ilias Tzempetonidis: We have a consolidated festival

What is the most important thing for you at the festival?

For me the most important thing is that Mallorca welcomes these stars to Cap Rocat, which is already a very suitable place to host a three-day music festival that is becoming more and more consolidated year by year. And without a doubt the opera Cavalleria, which opens the three-day festival, with the great Elina Garança, will be an unforgettable night.

It’s almost magical what they have achieved together with Pablo Mielgo and Antonio Obrador...

I don’t believe in miracles, I believe in work and passion. It is true that together with the whole Obrador family we have managed to make it possible for people from all over the world to come and enjoy the festival. The sky is the limit and Mallorca deserves a festival of this category, and the most important thing is that the local people, the Mallorcans, make it their own, that they come to enjoy music in a unique place. The orchestra conducted by Pablo Mielgo undoubtedly brings excellence, and is a great support, but note that Elina Garança will set foot on the island for the first time in her life to be at this unique festival. It is truly a luxury and it is wonderful that with artists of such a high level we can get closer to the Mallorcans. It is a very ambitious project.

Can such a thing be done without ambition?

No, absolutely not. You have to be ambitious, passionate and know that it is hard work to achieve something like this. My professional experience, at La Scala in Milan, in Munich, in Paris and now in Naples has been possible because artistically I am very ambitious. All this experience has brought me closer to the artists and allowed me to work on very ambitious projects. Ambition is necessary, but it has to be for something worthwhile, not for money, not for fame. You need ambition to create.

How can someone like me get this important message across, all this passion that I have and bring it to the local audience?

Cap Rocat is unique, a unique resort in the Mediterranean that has been made possible thanks to the vision of Antonio Obrador who wanted to unite it with art. It is a resort linked to culture, to art, and it is thanks to the vision of a Mallorcan who wanted to create something unique that does not resemble what happens at the Salzburg or Baden Baden festival, which are also held during the summer. Our ambition is that with the support of the Mallorcan people this will be the great artistic event of the summer in Spain. In order for the Mallorcan public to be the real driving force, we have put tickets on sale at an affordable price, so that no one feels excluded. It is not a festival aimed at tourists, although they are welcome, it is a festival aimed at those who are or live here. That is the only truth, that it has been created for the locals because they are the ones who will make it last.

The artists who come or have come have already become ambassadors of this marvellous island, because people are starting to talk about it.

because this festival is starting to be talked about in cultural centres all over the world and that is thanks to the message that the artists spontaneously spread when they talk about it wherever they go, around the world, in the artistic community all over the world.

When was your passion for music born?

I heard on the radio Medea by Maria Callas, I was a child but I remember perfectly what I felt through the music and what it conveyed. Something happened in me that made me want to know more of that great thing that I had felt thanks to the human voice. The human voice is what brings us closer to God, and if not look at the orthodox church that in its ceremonial, in its liturgy, only uses the voice, without instruments to accompany it, unlike the catholic church. For me, the human voice in the creations of geniuses such as Wagner, Donizetti, Mahler, does not need a passport to travel around the world, and it is equally understood in Spain as in Japan. I feel proud to be able to bring the human voice closer to others and for it to produce the same feeling I felt as a child.

The voice is a perfect instrument. It is so because it is human. It is not a piano, it is not a violin, it is not an object, it is a soul with a truth to convey and a colossal power. That is the absolute truth, especially today when music is played everywhere, from the supermarket to the taxi, but the thing about opera is that it has been created for a voice that will only be on stage for three hours to be received and felt by the audience. That is a colossal power.

Is the music heard, is it understood differently in Cap Rocat, which is not a normal theatre?

I would very much like to be able to answer that question after this edition, after the first festival, after having lived the first experience, I will be able to tell you about it properly. Last year’s experience with Sondra Radvanovsky was exceptional.

I imagine that you are already thinking about next year’s festival?

Not only next year’s festival, we are thinking about next years’ festivals. Our philosophy is to grow and go from top to top from year to year. Mallorca, Balearic Islands is already in the top of the most beautiful places in the world, the present Cap Rocat Festival surpasses the best of the best and has to become a reference when we talk about festivals, and it already is because it is not a common place associated with music, it is very different from an opera house.