12th Fora do Lugar 2023 - Early Musics International Festival

Fora do Lugar
Early Musics Internacional Festival
Festival Internacional de Músicas Antigas

Idanha-a-Nova
UNESCO Creative City of Music
Portugal

The challenge is on… Sounds of voices and instruments call to us from many a place: “Come to the lands of Idanha, where even the brambles bear roses". Here is where we’ll all be.

BACK TO THE FUTURE

Filipe Faria
Director Festival Fora do Lugar
Director Arte das Musas

ʻTogether we forge new paths, taking advantage of those that were already here, we feed our lungs, our eyes, our ears, we feel the wind, the heat, the cold and the rain on our skin… We follow those paths, all the paths, and here we are.ʼ

This is the year of the return to the future. After so long in abeyance, watching our places (and those of others) out of a window, we have returned. During those years we didn’t get to truly experience things. Or it seemed like we didn’t. We experimented less. We dreamt that we did, then we woke up in the same place. We saw all our places through windows, sometimes we could hear, sometimes even speak... but so often the place we were in was not the place where we wanted to be. It wasn’t bad, but enough is enough now. We’ve come a long way, but we want to be close again. Today we return to the future. To what would have been had we not been this long – so long – in abeyance. Today we begin a new phase, the second decade, here, in Idanha-a-Nova – the most beautiful place in the world – together... and we want to prove, more than ever, that being out of place is the best place to be.
Once again we will be sound, image, smell, taste and touch... This is our face, the face of this land that has always been here, long before we remember existing, long before our grandparents… It has always been here and we are lucky enough to inhabit it… Together we forge new paths, taking advantage of those that were already here, we feed our lungs, our eyes, our ears, we feel the wind, the heat, the cold and the rain on our skin… We follow those paths, all the paths, and here we are. And we do it all over again… just the same or choosing a different path this time.
The challenge is on… Sounds of voices and instruments call to us from many a place: “Come to the lands of Idanha, where even the brambles bear roses". Here is where we’ll all be.