The Roads of Friendship: Lourdes-Loreto
Twenty-five years ago we answered the call of Sarajevo, a martyred city torn apart by a fratricidal war. That concert was the first of the bridges of brotherhood we have built over the years, on a pilgrimage that has reached cities such as Jerusalem, Beirut, Moscow, Damascus, El Djem, New York right after 9/11, Nairobi, Redipuglia, Tehran, Kyiv, Yerevan…without forgetting the Concert of Fraternities, when we listened to the Dalai Lama’s message… Today the pandemic has perhaps made us all even more aware of our fragility and the universality of the experience of pain. But grief is not the only language without borders. While a new, harrowing conflict flares up, it is music – capable of overcoming all differences in culture, language, religion – that becomes the ambassador of our message of peace and solidarity. To crown the concerts in the sanctuaries where ailing people have flocked in search of comfort for centuries, I have chosen Mozart’s Ave verum corpus, in which the world’s pain echoes, but also all the hope Mankind is capable of.
Riccardo Muti
The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes hosts the first of The Roads of Friendship traditional concerts – the Ravenna Festival’s project that since 1997 has been visiting places that have made ancient and contemporary history to build “bridges of brotherhood through art and culture” and, through the “spark” of music, to rekindle dialogue, offer comfort, invite hope.
On July 11, in the esplanade du Rosaire, the square in front of the basilica, Maestro Riccardo Muti conducts his Luigi Cherubini Youth Orchestra and the Choir uniting Italian and Ukrainian artists. Between the opening of Vivaldi’s Magnificat and the voices of a hundred children rising in Mozart’s Ave verum corpus, the programme embraces Mozart’s Horn Concerto No. 1 K 412, Verdi’s Stabat Mater and Te Deum, the singing of a woman and a child, a psalm from the Orthodox liturgy, songs in Basque and Occitan. So, the many faces of pain – of those fleeing a conflict, living with a disability, facing illness, or mourning their loved ones – are answered by an ecumenical interweaving of voices, cultures, and spirituality that finds unity in the invocations to the Mother, image of all mothers.
The event is organized with L’Offrande Musicale, a festival that besides celebrating the natural beauty and cultural wealth of the Hautes-Pyrénéees department where it takes place, is committed to facilitate the participation of disabled audiences. The involvement of Felix Klieser and Beñat Achiary comes from this collaboration. Klieser is a German musician whose disability has not prevented him from becoming an exception horn player, whereas Achiary is a Basque singer who will perform Marian chants in Basque and Occitan, thus ideally joining the two sides of the Pyrenees. In Lourdes, Les Chanteurs Pyrénéens de Tarbes and Les Chanteurs Montagnards de Lourdes will also perform.
On July 14, The Roads of Friendship will reach the Pontifical Sanctuary of the Holy House of Loreto, the other destination of this journey, which in the worship of the Virgin Mary finds reason also for a dedication to Mariupol –the city of Mary, indeed–, a tribute which ideally extends to the victims of all wars.
The Roads of Friendship concert in Lourdes is supported by the Italian Ministry of Foreign affairs and international cooperation, the Italian Cultural Institute in Marseille, and the Emilia-Romagna Region.
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