Impressionistic Season Opening at the Auditorium: Color, Sound and Late Romanticism

When the season opening tastes of sea air and espresso

The evening began like so many autumn nights here in Mallorca: a brief shower that made the asphalt gleam, the soft patter of raindrops on the harbour porches and the smell of freshly brewed coffee drifting from the foyer. Tension in the Auditori de Palma was tangible. Not a conventional kickoff — rather an invitation to leave the armchair and let yourself be carried away. Under the baton of Pablo Mielgo, the programme of the OSIB season opening aimed precisely at this balance: impressionistic soundscapes interspersed with late-romantic force.

Turina: a small scene, great intimacy

The opening piece, Oración del torero by Joaquín Turina, felt like an opened curtain onto a private scene. Not a loud fanfare, but a contemplative miniature: a bullfighter, a whispered prayer, a single breath. The orchestra painted this silence with warm brushstrokes. You could hear the soft rustle of programmes, the distant murmur of the audience — and it was exactly this closeness that made the moment distinctly Mallorcan: big emotions without pathos.

De Falla and Debussy: between a seaside stroll and a fine drizzle

With Manuel de Falla the audience landed in the Noches en los jardines de España. The piano, played by Davide Cabassi, carried memories of evening sun and salty air. Cabassi played with precision and his own breathing, which did not imitate the familiar colours but re-told them. Some passages felt like a walk along the Paseo Marítimo after sunset: a step, a glance at the water, a glow on the horizon.

Between them Debussy's Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune unfolded like a gentle drizzle over the Parc de la Mar. The famous flute motifs floated so clearly you could almost hear the shadows of the palm trees. It was the art of not doing too much that impressed here: sound spaces that set the air vibrating and filled the room without overpainting it.

Strauss’s Don Juan: a storm with a view of the sea

To finish, Richard Strauss turned up the intensity. His Don Juan is not a courtly hero but a driven man — wild, demanding, brilliant. The orchestra swelled, wrestled with tempi and dynamics, and for a moment the entire Auditorium was electrified. It was dramatic, at times uncomfortable, but that very unease is what makes classical evenings exciting: you don't just leave the hall, you take an experience outside with you.

Concerts like this do the island good. They bring tourists, but above all they bring together Mallorca's residents, creating a cultural meeting place that even fills the small coffee stand in the foyer with life. The music stretches the evenings, extends the season — and ensures that Palma pulses even in the quieter months.

My tip: come early, enjoy an espresso in the foyer, watch the rain-painted sky over the harbour and leaf through the programmes. Those who want to linger longer will find many interpretations online. But the small, intimate things from this evening remain only on site: the voices afterwards, the quiet discussions about tempi and tone colors, the feeling that the music did something to us that night.

I walked along the quay after the concert. The notes still buzzed in my head, the sea murmured, and somewhere someone laughed at a sharp passage. That's how a season opener sounds when it makes you curious for more.