Thomas Adès has received the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Music and Opera for his original reinterpretation of the Western musical tradition in a catalog that covers all genres. The Foundation has also recognized his “communicative capacity that connects with diverse audiences.”
The winner, as recognized by the jury, “connects transversally with diverse audiences while opening horizons for the future” through an “extensive catalog of compositions that covers all genres: symphonic, pianistic, chamber music, ballet and opera. These qualities, together with his intense activity as a pianist and conductor, make him an essential reference in the current musical scene”, the minutes state.
According to Victor García, secretary of the jury and artistic director of the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the success of this great connection with the audience is “combining contemporary compositional techniques with resources to return emotion and expressiveness from the stage to the room”.
He also praises his ability to “restore music to its most natural space, which is the ear, creating a perfect harmony between the ear and the mind; This is what makes his music enormously modern, through a language that connects with affections, linking the rational with the emotional. Creating music that needs to be expressed, not just performed.”