Montserrat Figueras
On November 23 Montserrat Figueras lost in Barcelona at the age of 69 her fight against an insidious disease. We mourn her death, which leaves a great hole - with the admirers of her art all over the world and much more in her own artistic family, in the realm of art by Jordi Savall, whose soul and whose voice she was. For almost twenty years, Montserrat Figueras brought to the styriarte audience magnificent, especially spirited and touching encounters with treasures of her musical world as a singer and as a researcher. She will be sorely missed, even if we can take comfort in that we will never forget her unique artistry, her great humanity and her sensual spirituality.
You will find a musical farewell by Montserrat Figueras at www.alia-vox.com.
Montserrat Figueras was an outstanding performer in a vast vocal repertoire which spans the Mediaeval, Renaissance and Baroque periods. Born in Barcelona into a family of music-lovers, she performed while still very young with Enric Gispert and Ars Musicae, studying singing with Jordi Albareda as well as dramatic interpretation. In 1966, she began studying early singing techniques, from the troubadours to the Baroque, developing a highly individual approach which draws directly on original sources, both historical and traditional, unfettered by the influences of the post-Romantic school.
Her artistic and personal union with Jordi Savall, which has proved so fruitful in the couple’s multiple teaching, research and creative activities, dates from 1967. The mutually reciprocal, lasting impact of this collaboration on both their lives was particularly evident in the development of an innovative style of interpretation, characterised by great fidelity to the historical sources combined with an extraordinary creative and expressive power, that has exerted a decisive influence on the whole historical music movement.
In 1968, Figueras pursued her musical training in Basel (Switzerland) under Kurt Widmer, Andrea von Rahm and Thomas Binkley at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis and the Musikakedemie. In the 1970s, Montserrat Figueras rose to eminence as one of a generation of musicians who realised that vocal music before 1800 required a new technical and stylistic approach capable of restoring to the beauty and emotion of the voice, that most human of all forms of expression, the necessary balance between singing and declamation, with an emphasis on the poetic and spiritual dimension of the text.
