How was Xavier Fiol, according to his friend: "He is a great musician"

PalmaHe has an extraordinary natural talent for rhythm and a very fine sense of harmony. In fact, he even played bass with people from the Deià scene, linked to English punk, in groups like Sex Beatles. Who knows if it's because from a very young age he listened to music that didn't sound anywhere else on Mallorca: his older brother, Jaume, brought him the latest music records directly from London in the early 70s. The middle brother is Joan and the protagonist of these lines is the gallerist Xavier Fiol (Palma, 1962). He is brought to us by who would be, given the years they have known each other and the affection they have, the fourth brother: Ivan Albons.

Fiol and Albons have known each other since they were six years old, from Lluís Vives school, and they immediately became friends. Ivan tells us that Xavier's father was a teacher, and that "at their home, there was an atmosphere strongly marked by culture: there was a huge library, books everywhere, an office where his father read and worked". He was a man, he says, "with a genuine vocation for staying intellectually awake", and he remembers that he made index cards of the books he read. "That workspace of his father's marked Xavier a lot", confesses the friend. However: above all, what fascinated the two young men from Palma was music: "We lived immersed in a constant fantasy of pop and rock".

This is why the musical news arriving from London thanks to Xavier's older brother were, for both of them, "a treasure", in Ivan's words: "Many times I stayed to sleep at his place: we would improvise a bed on the floor and spend the night talking about songs, lyrics, guitars, and the records that were arriving from England". This is how they let themselves be seduced by the songs of Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and Crosby, Stills & Nash, among many others. Xavier, according to Ivan, had a boundless imagination and a very creative mind. Besides, "as a child he was extraordinarily funny. With him, laughter was guaranteed", he assures.

The young men, Ivan recounts, grew up in a Palma that had just emerged from the dictatorship and where the winds of freedom were beginning to blow. "We were very close to all the anarchist and countercultural effervescence that was happening in those years. There were places like El Trui, in the square where the Es Baluard museum is now, which was a real center for rock music and cultural agitation. All that movement marked us deeply". And, from time to time, they would go out to Deià to experience that particular scene and see people like Kevin Ayers.

This obsession had to be channeled somehow, so around the age of eighteen they formed a band together, also with their friend Pere Pla: Ex Cocodriles. "It ended up being one of the most important bands on the Mallorcan "}underground scene of the eighties. We played many concerts, we recorded several albums, and we lived through a very intense period within the alternative movement of Palma". With great enthusiasm, in 1986 they moved to Madrid, but the Ex Cocodriles project didn't quite consolidate. "Xavier decided to return to Palma to finish his Art History degree, and I think he made the right decision". Nevertheless, the friend points out that the gallery owner "is a great musician".

Regarding Xavier's character, Ivan points out that even as a young man "he was a very sensitive person". Before art became his profession, "he already showed great interest in all artistic disciplines". In his early days as a gallery owner, he began to work hand in hand with Joan Oliver Maneu, "a very important figure for him". Little by little, he built a career until he became "one of the reference people for art at the state level", says Ivan proudly. "He has a great eye for detecting talent".