First of all, I want to say a big thank you! Curiosa’s first project, Other Lands Other Sounds, has concluded, and I think it’s very safe to say, it was a rousing success. So thank you to everyone who believed in us, everyone who came along to Portugal, who supported us as we made the work, and who encouraged us from afar. It all made a massive difference, and enabled us to do something amazing.
Suffice to say, we had a great experience in Gois this summer, and we’ll definitely be going back next year. We spent the first four days collecting material, playing together, and sparking mini collaborations. The fifth day we took off and went on a hike and a picnic by the waterfall – unfortunately, the skies chose that one day to send us a torrential downpour, so our picnic became very watery, very quickly! Days 6-9 were dedicated to pulling together all that material and shaping it into pieces, and on the evening of the 9th day we even performed one of our pieces with the Gois Filharmonic! Day 10 was for finalizing all the details, running tech, and performing our new works. It’s incredible what you can do with sensitive guidance – supplied by our very talented artistic director Filipe Sousa – and an ambitious schedule.
We’ve received excellent feedback from all our participants, who told us that the experience had definitely served to challenge and grow their practice. I’ll take that as a job well done.
I’ll be updating Curiosa’s website with more details and media about the event over the course of the next month or two, so you can always pop over there to learn more and see what projects I’ll be working on next! It may be that Croatia enters the picture again, we’ll see!