The recital, titled Orkestra, is a preview of the festival to be held in Kobetamendi in July. Richard Balcombé, the English conductor and arranger, has reinterpreted iconic songs from bands such as Coldplay, The Cure, Guns N’ Roses, and Depeche Mode. As Balcombé explained to DEIA, “the old prejudices between classical and pop no longer exist; they are just different and incomparable styles.”

Orkestra, which starts at 8:00 PM with tickets priced at 32 euros, aims to be “a tribute to the festival’s journey and the emotional connection that unites artists, audience, and the city.” It is also conceived as “an invitation to bring symphonic music to new audiences,” according to Last Tour, the Biscayan promoter organizing the event. This project is supported by the BBK Banking Foundation, the Provincial Council of Bizkaia, Kutxabank, and San Miguel.

The idea originated from Last Tour, as part of the complementary activities for the festival’s anniversary. The BOS accepted the challenge of creating “a totally symphonic project without singers, featuring iconic songs that have been heard in Kobetamendi,” explained Borja Pujol, the orchestra’s technical director. Pujol added, “they gave us their wish list of groups and songs, and we made a few suggestions, very little.”

Given that the main difficulty was securing “good orchestral arrangements,” BOS collaborators in England suggested hiring Balcombé because “he is very good as an arranger and as a conductor for this type of project,” according to Pujol. The BOS spokesperson stated that “some songs already had some symphonic arrangements, but since the program was so heterogeneous and we didn’t know how they would work, it was decided to start from scratch and create new arrangements for all the pieces.”

The nearly 80 musicians of the BOS received the scores within “a very short period, in just the quarter” from Christmas to last March, as Balcombé works with a team of four arrangers. The rest went smoothly because the BOS “is already accustomed to this type of project,” as confirmed by their occasional participations in Aste Nagusia or annual appearances in Ura Bere Bidean. Pujol commented that “15 or 20 years ago it would have taken more rehearsal time, as the orchestra was not so accustomed to that particular swing and rhythm of rock. Sometimes it’s very square, it has syncopations…”

Balcombé is an internationally renowned orchestra conductor and arranger, with over 30 years of collaboration with the BBC Concert Orchestra and experience in opera, theater, and musicals with orchestras from five continents and artists like Bryan Ferry, UB40, Cliff Richard, and Gladys Knight. “I continue to do classical concerts, as well as pop music ones, as I have the ability to feel both aspects of music and move back and forth between them,” the British conductor told DEIA.

Accustomed to adapting pop and rock to orchestrations, Balcombé identified the adaptation of Robbie Williams’ song Rock DJ as “the biggest problem” encountered during the preparation of Orkestra. “In it, not only is a melody sung, but there are also more spoken or rapped parts. There, my colleague Scarlett managed to synchronize them with the transfer to the symphonic world,” explained the British conductor, praising the BOS.

“It has wonderful performers and is an orchestra very open to receiving ideas and proposals. I have noticed a very big change from the first contact to the second and third. The improvement has been very significant because it is an open orchestra and, at the same time, very fun to collaborate with,” added Balcombé, who denied that there is currently a prejudice considering popular music inferior to what was once called classical music. “When I started, it was seen as a bigger division. Today, not anymore; orchestras seek to expand their audiences to survive, and it is more common. However, when Tchaikovsky is performed, the audience is different from those who will come to see Orkestra in Bilbao,” the conductor noted. When asked if The Beatles and The Beach Boys, groups he will adapt symphonically in the coming weeks, are as important as Puccini, Verdi, or Mozart, he asserted that “all of them, in their worlds, are at the top, at the top of the tree; what happens is that they are different trees and cannot be compared.”

The show will adapt classics such as The Cure’s Just Like Heaven; Depeche Mode’s Enjoy the Silence; Arcade Fire’s Wake Up; Rosalía’s La Perla; The Strokes’ classic, Last Nite; Guns N’ Roses’ Sweet Child O’ Mine; The Police’s Roxanne; Pulp’s Common People, or Coldplay’s Viva La Vida. This journey through generations and styles will reveal new emotional layers in songs that are part of the collective imagination. Versions by Florence + The Machine, Kylie Minogue, Muse, Radiohead, Faith No More, Weezer, REM, and Brian Wilson, former leader of Beach Boys, will also be heard. Rosalía’s La perla has also been included recently.

The Bilbao BBK Live festival will take place on July 9, 10, and 11, featuring artists such as composer, singer, actress, model, and dancer FKA twigs, Calvin Harris, Robbie Williams, David Byrne, Dellafuente, IDLES, and Lily Allen, among others. Day tickets are available at a promotional price of 80 euros. Three-day passes are still on sale on the Bilbao BBK Live website for 180 euros, or 218 euros with campsite access. The pass for groups costs 150 euros.