At Mallorca Live, in reality, the music is secondary. This sensation, which is increasingly repeated when talking about festivals, becomes a certainty in the island case if one analyzes the financial architecture that sustains the events linked to the Mallorca Live brand. Above all, a festival that in two weeks will celebrate its ninth edition, rebranded as Mallorca Live Occident. The entry of new sponsors and partners into the new promoter La Isla & Co is the latest step in a path full of countless commercial movements that are difficult to follow and, above all, to decipher: the tip of the iceberg of a network of dozens of companies that move millions of public euros to turn culture into a financial asset.

Mallorcans do not know our anthem. In our country, unless you are from Sóller or a slightly eccentric person, you do not know how to sing La Balanguera. And by knowing how to sing it, I mean the whole song, not just the chorus, and with the emotion it requires.

The music scene of the Balearic Islands has also raised its voice against the tourist overcrowding experienced in the Archipelago, and more and more groups and artists are dedicating songs to denounce the saturation and how residents have been relegated to being practically second-class citizens to the detriment of tourists. The latest to do so have been the Mallorcan artists Amulet and Xisk, who have released the track In Paradise, a new criticism of tourist overcrowding and the current model of the Balearic Islands. In the song, they ironically and poignantly review the problems that this saturation derives from and how the Archipelago has become a theme park where residents are the last. In fact, the first line of the song already makes this message clear: "I come from a land that no longer wants me. Theme park, next to Hong Kong".

The program notes of Calidoscopi, the latest creation by Estudi Zero, state that “characters are moved by absurd, violent, or profoundly human situations”. True, but it would be even more so if the conjunction were copulative instead of disjunctive. If the situations are absurd and violent, it is clear that they are undeniably very human. The caricature does not distort reality but accentuates it, so that this bold, irrational, and bizarre point makes the metaphorical drawing of the human condition arrive with more effectiveness. That the performance is composed of different small stories brings the Sans seal, in such a way that it transports us to that journey that Karl Valentin was piloting in this very room. For the occasion, several authors are listed in the roster of Calidoscopi –Esteve Soler, Juan Mayorga and Joël Pommerat–, which makes the mood of the different sketches raise the heat of each one considerably. There is no white humor. All contain a high dose of venom, in the same proportion as causticity and sarcasm, and without fear of crossing red lines.The first story, that of the man run over by a bus, about which I will say no more because it would be a spoiler, sets the tone of the performance. Black humor in its purest form. Human cruelty or lack of humanity, which in this case is the same, shines with all its splendor. That of the couple who confess to their twenty-year-old son that he was not a desired child, exponentially increases the portion of inhumanity. That of the seller of anything you can imagine is a mirror directed towards the stalls. And so on. All in all, rounded off with a musical number performed by Dominic Hull, a My way in the purest crooner style, accompanied by the rest of the cast and dressed as Fortunio Bonanova and the Glamouramas were in their glorious American years. Naturally, in such a diverse ensemble it is not easy to find the ideal point of homogeneity, but, even so, the performance treasures enough uniformity, both in the different stories and in the interpretation of the seven protagonists, who in such a marathon performance become an immense crowd of characters, always dressed very differently. Only a small caveat, the wigs are not very necessary. With the different changes of register, which are there, it is enough.

Sidonie is one of the benchmark bands of Spanish alternative pop with its own discourse that, over more than two decades of career, has evolved without losing its identity. Recently, however, the Barcelona-based group made an unexpected and significant turn: their latest album, Catalan graffiti (2025), is the first entirely in Catalan. On the eve of their concert at TribuFest in Felanitx, on Friday, May 29, their singer, Marc Ros, also talks about the life stage they are going through, their doubts, their successes, and the need to reconnect with music from a freer and more essential perspective.

One more summer, the cultural agendas of the Balearic Islands multiply their capacity between June and September with the arrival of dozens of cycles and festivals that lead to hundreds of concerts that, with so much competition, do not always achieve the expected diffusion and often end up buried by the avalanche of parallel proposals. We have asked performers, critics, and music managers to help us make a selection of essential live performances. The selection that has emerged goes through Mallorca, Menorca, and Formentera – in Ibiza, electronics monopolizes the summer musical programming – and includes proposals of all styles and for all tastes, from Celtas Cortos to La Zowi, passing through Antònia Font and the Symphony.

The challenge was very risky. The liaison between the Principal Theatre of Inca and the Orquestra de Cambra de Mallorca is yielding increasingly tasty fruits. That said, it is worth praising this latest achievement, which surely will not be the last, nor by a long shot, such as the complete staging of Mozart's Così fan tutte, with only small and not at all significant plot cuts which, on the other hand, have managed to give great fluidity to the narrative and make everything flow with maximum naturalness for a story that, like almost all farcical comedies, does not aim for any semblance or credibility. The intention lies in the background of the plot, which, in this case, is well-filled with readings. So much so that Miquel Àngel Raió, the artistic director of this success, has changed the discourse as much as possible, saving a bit of what "all" do. It was not easy to win a tug-of-war against Lorenzo da Ponte. We'll leave it at that. Raió, where he has undoubtedly been fundamental has been in the staging and everything related to the setting –appropriate, simple, and efficient–, in the very careful direction of actors and all other elements that, with the scenographic and stylistic collaboration of Adema, make everything run smoothly without hitches or delays. He even derives plot benefit from the incorporation of the three dancers.

After announcing their brief return, Ossifar has released a new song, I Don't Like Reggaeton, which can now be heard on digital platforms. The track is the result of this reunion with the public and was presented this past Wednesday at El Corte Inglés, where the group also announced that on May 30th they will have a meet-and-greet with fans, including a signing and photo session.

The Santa Maria del Camí Town Council this Sunday named singer Llorenç Santamaria an Illustrious Son during an extraordinary plenary session held at Ses Cases des Mestres, coinciding with the town's Fair Day. The agreement was approved unanimously by all municipal groups.

Gemma Camps (Palma, 1994) will fulfill a dream on April 24 and 25. Or close a circle. Or both at the same time. It will be then when she returns to the Teatre Principal in Palma, where she says she fell in love with opera. Now, with the commission to direct one. “I perfectly remember the first one I saw there, sitting in the stalls at 15 years old. It was La Bohème, and I knew immediately that I wanted to dedicate myself to this,” she admits. Sixteen years later, she will be in charge of the musical direction of La veu humana, a production that is part of the 40th edition of the Principal's Opera Season. With stage direction by Roberto G. Alonso and Marga Cloquell as soprano, it is expected to be one of the premieres of the season. It certainly will be for Camps, who at 31 years old has become one of the prominent figures in musical direction, a field where even now women, and much more so young women, are an exception. According to the most comprehensive study to date on this issue, by the SGAE Foundation, women directors did not reach 8% in 2019.

The summer festival La Lluna en Vers returns in 2026 to Mallorca with a program of 14 nights of open-air culture spread across different points of the island and an image marked by the eclipse of August 12, which this year inspires the visual and symbolic narrative of the project.

He was a futsal goalkeeper until he started to be afraid of the balls. He also did swimming. He liked (and maybe still does) playing Pro Evolution Soccer with friends. He has a younger brother, with whom they grew up in the Escorxador neighborhood. He is a "polyhedral and difficult to explain" character. Perhaps it is his elusive and distant character at first rather than anything else, but even his lifelong friend, Àngel Mendoza, finds it difficult to define the character of Lluís Cabot (Palma, 1990), musician and producer. He is known, above all, for having been the leaderof Da Souza for a decade. Àngel Mendoza, who will introduce us to the character, was the band's drummer.

The Balearic Islands Symphony Orchestra has registered a complete sell-out in the two concerts it offered this week at the Cervantes Theatre in Malaga, as part of the artistic exchange with the Malaga Philharmonic Orchestra. More than 2,000 people attended the performances on Thursday and Friday, the institution reported in a statement.

Manacor hosts this weekend, April 11 and 12, a new edition of Acampallengua, the youth gathering in Catalan that combines music, popular culture, and linguistic advocacy. Parc de na Molla will be the center of a program with more than 30 activities, camping, and concerts until dawn.

This March, singer Júlia Colom published a tune on social media that is not part of any of the albums she has released to date. It is a song written by her and her brother Martí, in which she speaks of a Mallorca that cries, of historic records, and of what, Colom says, we all know we have to do when the day gets longer: “stay inside at home so as not to bother them too much”. In a video that begins with a close-up of her and ends with an image of a hotel on the Majorcan coast, the singer from Valldemossa states: “Mallorca, you have been punished, / for getting the maximum profit: / a seasonal product / that now lasts all year round”. It is just the latest example of a whole series of songs with which island musicians and singers have demonstrated against mass tourism in recent years.

Toni Aragón, director of the Professional Conservatory of Music and Dance of Mallorca, a key figure in the musical training of the Balearic Islands, has died.

The Catalan artist Laia Rius, who leads the musical project Nastallat, presented this Wednesday in Palma her proposal Cada casa, cada vida, a work that fuses electronic music with ball de bot with the aim of bringing tradition to new scenic spaces and audiences. The initiative opts for a contemporary reinterpretation of traditional music, conceived especially for live performance and aimed at generating a collective experience around dance, the artist reported at the presentation.

The question in the headline has no answer, but Verdi's biographer, Julian Budden, stated that it was in the Requiem that he showed the greatest concentration of his genius. Among so many requiems that inhabit the universe of music, it is not very difficult to think, with many elements of judgment, that this one we are discussing is the most complex, monumental, and anthological of all of them. It was not a genre that Giuseppe Verdi had cultivated much. It was his participation, with a Libera me Domine, which, along with twelve other composers, they dedicated to Gioachino Rossini, the "swan of Pesaro." A piece that was not even premiered when its first performance was planned, the commemoration of the first anniversary of the death of the person to whom it was dedicated. Verdi rescued it when he decided to dedicate his to Alessandro Manzoni. Thus began the history of this colossal musical skyscraper, which we enjoyed as the sixth concert of the season by the Balearic Islands Symphony Orchestra, along with the UIB choir, conducted by Núria Cunillera, Mira Alkhovix, soprano; Sílvia Tro Santafé, mezzosoprano; Antoni Lliteres, tenor, and Simón Orfila, bass. Pablo Mielgo conducted the event.

The Manacor-based bands Nita, Garrafa Nadal, Saïm, and Reïna have announced the formation of the association Punyeta Món, a collective created to foster mutual support in the face of the precariousness and difficulties inherent in the music industry and its inconsistencies: "To pool financial resources, have shared equipment, and self-finance concerts, where and why." Their first action will be a joint boycott of Spotify on March 27th. The members have invited other artists and supporters to join the boycott and support the initiative. "Puñeta Món is an escape, but also a meeting point. It's the expression of a shared rage among like-minded groups who don't see music as a commodity," they explained in a statement.

A concert for those who cultivate a love for music. Perhaps for that reason, and because there were many children, students from the Conservatory, the Auditorium on the Passeig Marítim had a delightful atmosphere. The program was enticing, enticing from beginning to end. It began with theOpening No. 3, of Leonora, which Beethoven considered too important and imposing to lose relevance as the beginning of an opera, the only one he composed, Fideliowhich should first be said as the piece in question. And so, imposing, with lime and corresponding, sounded the prologue to the seventh concert of the season of the Illes Balears Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Pablo Mielgo. A majestic presentation, I would even say with a special demeanor on the part of the conductor and the sixty musicians who accompanied him on this very special evening when interpreting such a precise musical synopsis of what would be the only operatic composition by the genius of Bonn. It was clear that there was a desire to please a little more than usual and they made that clear from the first bars.