ENCONTROS MED [medieval / mediterranean]

The ENSEMBLE MED [mediterranean/medieval] annually sets up a meeting of artists from the Mediterranean Basin in Idanha-a-Nova, Portugal, an ancestral place where tradition, innovation and contemporaneity coexist, paying homage to the intangible musical heritage of its Mediterranean and/or Medieval roots, within written and oral tradition, mainly in Adufe / Framedrum playing.

ENCONTROS MED MONSANTO 2023 took place from 8th to 10 December in the Historical Village of Monsanto, with classes, public performances and lectures, placing Adufe at the center of the mediation between invited artists, participants and the local community of Monsanto. For the training course, we have invited the Adufeiras de Monsanto, an iconic group of adufe songs from the Beira Baixa and Idanha-a-Nova regions, who will be accompanied by Rui Silva, a herald of artistic research into traditional and modern adufe in Portugal; the medievalist Mauricio Molina (Barcelona / City University of New York), who this year proposes a Chants and Frame Drums from the Ancient World and finally Murat Coskun (Tamburi Mundi Frame Drum Academy), with a Mediterranean perspective in "Origins of Mediterranean Rhythms".

Encontros Med is supported by the Directorate General for the Arts and is part of the Idanha-a-1000 programme, a project coordinated by the Filarmónica Idanhense and co-organised by the Municipality of Idanha-a-Nova, supported by the Monsanto and Idanha-a-Velha Parish Council and Turismo de Portugal. The ADUFEIR@_Ensemble Med, Amélia Fonseca & José Alberto Gomes residency explores the oral tradition of Monsanto village, through the live memory of Adufeira D. Amélia Fonseca, with the contemporary creation of José Alberto Gomes (live electronics) and is supported by the European Festivals Fund for Emerging Artists – EFFEA, an initiative of the European Festivals Association (EFA), co-funded by the European Union.