Gandia Polysonic Festival
Sounds to brighten up your summer nights
WE WERE worried it might be lost for good this year, but our fears were unfounded: The show is set to go on for Gandia's spectacular, eclectic Polysonic Festival, albeit with fewer fans.
Typically, this much-loved al fresco music season, staged in the Casa de Cultura gardens, has space for up to 600 spectators – and is always a sell-out. But the 2020 edition will see ticket numbers reduced to 180 per concert, to allow plenty of space between people, who will be shown individually to their allocated slots (€10 per show for a prime-viewing seat and €8 for a gallery place, with a €2 discount on each for holders of youth or pensioners' cards) and will only be allowed in if they are wearing masks, which must remain on your face throughout.
A varied medley of artists from both sides of the pond bring you a blend of modern and traditional melodies, an eclectic repertoire and a whole alphabet of instruments, as the festival name suggests.
All shows start at 22.30.
FRIDAY, JULY 31 LEO MINAX QUARTET
This Brazilian genius draws from his roots in his highly-modern, but timeless collection of pop, rock and easy listening – acoustic guitar and thought-provoking, poetic vocals with a dash of Samba and Bossanova, and the African and Portuguese-Celtic touches that this huge South American country's rich past collected along its way. Shut your eyes and you'll picture the white-clad, floral-dressed, backflipping capoeira and candomblé dancers of the tropical Atlantic shores and taste the bittersweet tang of a stiff caipirinha on the rocks.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 1 MATTHIEU SAGLIO QUARTET
Plundering his French origins for all their worth, this master cellist opted to break out of the classical chamber orchestra comfort zone of the prestigious conservatoire in Rennes where he trained, and has adapted, duetted and big-banded with upand-coming vocalists and musicians from his native country's former colonies – Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Sénégal, Vietnam – and from Latin America and, of course, Spain, where he now lives. A curious Afro-ArabMediterranean-Jazz fusion that defies classification, you'll feel yourself hopping from Parisian music bars to the souks of North Africa, via a hefty dose of flamenco and even a bit of Argentine Tango.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 7 IVAN SINGH BAND
Born in Córdoba (Argentina, that is), despite his tender age – 26 – Ivan Singh is already acknowledged to be one of the biggest names on the blues-electro guitar scene in his native South American country. Not just your bog-standard music-shop guitar, though: His is a home-made creation using a biscuit tin.
Ivan's virtuoso, timeless tracks will appeal to lovers of early and classic rock, house, jazz, and a mixture of all four – and he's already been a sell-out across Europe and the Americas, earning standing ovations at the House of Blues, the Buddy Guy's Legends and the Chicago Blues Festival.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 8 THE SWEET VANDALS
Bang-up-to-date Spanish funk brought to you by this fivesome from Madrid and fronted by the powerful vocals of its sole female member and founder, Mayka Ejole (formerly of the Moby Dic Club Band and the Mengano Quintet), with modern soul, blues, jazz and groove thrown in for good measure. Their début single, I got you, man!, swiftly became a cult hit on the deep-funk underground scene and has been played by world-renowned DJs time and again, leading the Vandals onto a non-stop trail of gigs at Europe's top music festivals, and even to México and Réunion Island (between Madagascar and Mauritius).
Providing the soundtracks for Nike and Fiat adverts, and storming the UK charts with their hit Beautiful (their second album was recorded at the BBC's Maida Vale Studios, which has churned out the likes of Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, Coldplay and The White Stripes), Mayka and her boys just keep on soaring up the global funk ladder. And yet they're letting you watch them live for a tenner, so don't miss them.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 14 CARMEN PARÍS
Composer and singer Carmen's power-filled voice hits you deep in your soul, and her rich repertoire will take you on an express trip around Spain through its traditional music, but through 21st-century eyes and ears. This Tarragona-born diva manages to fuse jazz with flamenco, the Arab-style andalusí music of the Moors from the south, and the jota from Aragón, which is less about castañets and gypsy guitars and more about the windy, rain-splashed emerald hills that Celtic rhythms always seem to conjure up. One of her albums even manages to blend all this in with Cuban beats (she wrote the songs and music whilst in La Habana, and recorded it in Madrid). Another, recorded in Boston with the Greg Hopkins Concert Jazz Orchestra, mixes big-band jazz with jota and lyrics in Spanish and English, as part of her lifelong ambition to get the folk music of her resident region (she lives in Zaragoza) onto the world map.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 15 THE RAY GELATO & ENRIC PEIDRÓ QUINTET
London-born and half-American sax virtuoso, jazz, swing and jump blues legend Ray Gelato helped spearhead the modern swing revival and has performed in private gigs for Richard Branson, Paul McCartney, Bryan 'Everything I Do' Adams, and even Queen Elizabeth II. Imagine how much these celebrities would have paid him – and yet you won't have to shell out more than €10 plus petrol and drinks.
In the immortal words of Jools Holland, Gelato 'plays what he means and means what he plays', and endorsement from the OBE ex-Squeeze vocalist can't be wrong, neither can an appearance at the 2004 Proms in the Park or on the BBC's Strictly Dance Fever.
Here, Gelato (Ray Keith Irwin to his nearest and dearest) is joined by his regular scene partners, the Enric Peidró Swingtet. Led by the Alcoiborn tenor-sax of the same name, this 'famous five' is one of the biggest names on the classical jazz and swing circuit in southern Europe, and almost as huge on the Med as Gelato is in London.