5,000 fans attend concert in Spain

BARCELONA, Spain — If one overlooked the white masks dotting the tightly packed crowd of music lovers, it was almost like pre-pandemic times in Barcelona’s Palau Sant Jordi concert hall Saturday night.

Five thousand rock fans enjoyed a real-as-can-be concert after passing a same-day coronavirus screening — a test of its effectiveness in preventing outbreaks of the virus at large cultural events.

The only rule was strict use of the high-quality masks provided by the concert organizers.

“We were able to evade reality for a while,” said 40-year-old Jose Parejo. “We were inside our small concert bubble. And we were even able to remember back in time when things like this one were normal.”

The show by Spanish rock group Love of Lesbian had the special permission of Spanish health authorities. While the rest of the country is limited to gatherings of no more than four people in closed spaces, the concertgoers were able to mix freely.

The musicians were also swept up in the moment.

“It’s been a year and half since we last set foot on a scenario as a band,” singer Santi Balmes told the crowd. “This is so … some of the musicians are crying over here.”

Ticket buyers chose between three venues where they could take a quick antigen test Saturday morning. Those with negative results got a code on their cellphones validating their tickets for the 7 p.m. show.

Organizers said it was the first commercial event with an audience that big held in Europe during the pandemic.

The show was sold out. The tickets, ranging from $27-$33, included the cost of the test and the mask that was obligatory except when eating or drinking in designated areas.

The concert was backed by local authorities and by experts of Barcelona’s The Fight AIDS and Infectious Diseases Foundation, which also organized a case study around a concert of 500 people in December. They said that study demonstrated that pre-screening with antigen tests and the use of masks succeeded in preventing infections at the concert despite there being no social distancing rules.