21 Portuguese artists provide music in the biggest show of the european – Diário de Notícias – Lisbon

Portugal is the country featured in this year’s edition of the music festival Eurosonic, which begins today in Groningen, in the Netherlands.

a Lot has changed in the music industry since 2001, the year in which the Gift took part in the Eurosonic. The band of Alcobaça, in height with a single disk, edited, gave the first steps, as it recalls the keyboard player and bassist John Gonçalves, to whom the prominence given to Portugal, in this year’s edition of the festival, “it is a dream come true.”

Since it was created in 1986, this will be the first time that the Eurosonic Noorderslag will take Portugal as a country in the spotlight. The event, which attracts every year to the Dutch town of Groningen more than four thousand professionals of the music industry, among which about 400 representatives of the biggest international festivals, is one of the largest showcases of music at the european level, where they made, among many others, Franz Ferdinand, James Blake, Lykke Li, Benjamin Clementine, The xx or the Portuguese Buraka Som sistema.

Despite being early in the career, the Gift already had the goal of conquering the international markets and presence at the Eurosonic was seen by the band as something fundamental. “We went to Eurosonic and shortly after we also went to South by Southwest in Texas. At the time we were just us, doing everything alone. It was a reality that has nothing to do with today,” says John.

The planning of the Portuguese participation in the Eurosonic is today the position of Why Portugal, a platform for the promotion of Portuguese music, created by the Association of Musicians, Artists and Independent Publishers (LOVED) in partnership with various professional associations of the sector.

This return to the festival, 16 years later, the goals of The Gift are well-defined: “we Hope to get some agents europeans, talk with the programmers of festivals already thinking about 2018, and to continue to create awareness for our new album with Brian Eno.”

Year zero of the Portuguese music

One of the rookies this year is DJ Ride, which presents, in the company of Stereossauro, with the duo Beatbombers, recently voted world champion in the scratch. For this musician, in addition to the possibility of a “make contacts to be able to edit and play more outside the Uk”, the festival has another advantage, “to give to know also a lot of new music,” promising that why it will “be attentive to the showcases of other”artists”.

The mere presence at the Eurosonic is not however a species of euromillions to the musicians, explains Pedro Coquenão, the creator of the Beat, which will this year for the third time at the festival, now with the project ” The Almost Perfect DJ. “In my first participation I believed that I was to present my work would be enough, but it was not because I lacked a booker. In addition to a good show, you need good promotion and someone that makes all the rest of it off the stage,” says Peter, whose second experience was completely different. “With the promotion and attention that I got with the first disc international and already with a booker european, I had the room exhausted, with some developers-key to watch, as the festivals of Glastonbury or Roskilde.” Result: it was in this year the artist with the most markings through the program of Eurosonic.

“it Is a festival with the clear goal of giving exposure and cause of encounters between artists, programmers, publishers, press and other agents,” says the artist, who, in time, raise personal expectations, would prefer, so yes, appreciate the fact that Portugal is the country in focus. “It is an achievement of artists who have contributed to the enrichment of the music made in Portugal, the media and agents who have invented ways to counter the size of the Portuguese market.”

it is striking that, among the nine proposals the must-sees of this year, chosen by the media accredited at the Eurosonic, three are Portuguese: the Memory of Fish, Best Youth, and ” First Breath After Coma. In this comprehensive sample of the current diversity of national music, are still names like Gisela João, Noiserv, Marta Ren or Rodrigo Leão. For John Gonçalves, by the curiosity that will wake up this true Portuguese embassy, this may turn out to be “a kind of year zero for the music of the national. But he warns: “it Is necessary to have the notion that there is still much to do.”