Meet Joaquín Achúcarro

About this event

The Basque pianist Joaquín Achúcarro (b. 1932) celebrated his 4x20th birthday last autumn. He is still fully fit and continues to travel tirelessly around the world, from concert hall to concert hall, faithfully returning to Torroella de Montgrí every summer for his reunion with the Festival audience. He first came in 1990, when at the end of a concert in Barcelona, “a gentleman with a smile at once mild and benevolent, tempting and cunning", as Achúcarro describes Josep Lloret, suggested that the pianist should come to perform at a festival in the Empordà.

Over his long career, Joaquín Achúcarro has played many times in the same town or city, but the record of unbroken visits is held by the Torroella Festival. Achúcarro will talk to Josep Lloret, Artistic Director of the Festival and President of Joventuts Musicals de Torroella de Montgrí, about his memories of those first concerts, the master classes, his increasing friendship with the audience, and how he has seen the Festival grow over the years. Achúcarro will also tell us about his passionate interest in physics and how his family is related to the Norwegian composer, Edvard Grieg.