April festivities in Lisbon

The April festivities gain a greater expression and meaning this year, with the celebrations of the fifty years of the Carnation Revolution which, in Lisbon, will be remembered and celebrated throughout the city: on the streets and in various cultural spaces.

In the program, which runs over the next month, we illustrate April 25, 1974, through photography, theatre, dance, music, contemporary art and poetry, capturing the past, celebrating the present, but also projecting the future.

The highlight will be on the night of April 24th, at Terreiro do Paço, at a big party promoted by Lisbon City Council and produced by EGEAC.

This celebration begins, at 10 pm, with a videomapping, on the facades of Terreiro do Paço, composed of photographs by Alfredo Cunha and music by Rodrigo Leão, in partnership with the Commemorative Commission 50 years of the 25th of April.

This will be followed by the concert Uma Ideia de Futuro, which will bring together six young actors on stage, with the Orquestra Sinfonietta de Lisboa, the Choir of Santo Amaro de Oeiras, the Choir of the Artistic School of the Instituto Gregoriano de Lisboa and several soloists, totalling 180 musicians. Six stories narrated in the first person, drawing a portrait of today’s Portugal and showing the path taken, inspire the soundtrack, composed from songs by José Afonso, José Mário Branco, Sérgio Godinho, Fausto, Adriano Correia de Oliveira, Fernando Lopes Graça and Carlos Paredes. The stories and songs will be accompanied by projected images.

Designed and artistically directed by Luís Varatojo, this show also features a new theme, April is Always Spring, with lyrics by José Luís Peixoto and music by Luís Varatojo and Filipe Raposo, and culminates with a pyro-musical note.

But the April festivities start this month. Starting next Saturday (the 23rd), and until May 26th, we will open at the Mercado do Forno do Tijolo, in Arroios, the exhibition “The ten Days that shook Portugal” from the EPHEMERA Archive. An initiative integrated into the Municipal and National Celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the 25th of April, which witnesses the beginning of democracy after the Revolution.

The Aljube Museum – a symbolic stage of resistance and freedom – opens the new exhibition 25th of April, Always!, which proposes a journey through resistance from the 25th of April 1974 to the present day. It will also have its doors open with two days of celebration (20th and 21st) and many guest artists, will lead a tour through emblematic places of the revolution and will participate in a podcast to Think about the 25th of April through the Humanities.

With varied proposals, for all ages, and mostly free, the April Festivities take place in other museums, monuments, galleries, theatres and cinemas managed by EGEAC.

At the Bairro Alto Theater, there will be on stage (12th and 13th) Guide for a Possible Country, a show by Sara Barros Leitão, created based on records from the Portuguese parliament.

Castelo de São Jorge invites everyone to participate in craft workshops (14th, 21st, 25th and 28th) to Make the Castle, April, building a mural of paper carnations with messages of freedom.

On the 18th, we began a cycle of conversations at the Fado Museum around the legacy of freedom and artistic independence of Amália Rodrigues, conceived and moderated by Miguel Carvalho, author of the book Amália, Ditadura e Revolution.

The songs, words, stories, texts and poems also serve as inspiration for two other proposals for the April Festivals: the show Quis Saber Quem Sou, by Teatro Nacional Dona Maria II, with text and direction by Pedro Penim, who takes the stage at Teatro São Luiz (20th to 28th), and Book Day – Radio Night, marking World Book Day (23rd), at Casa Fernando Pessoa, giving a voice to radio journalists to remember that it was radio to say the first word on the night of April 24th to 25th, 1974.

Also noteworthy is Luisa Cunha – a work in six parts, a sound work to be heard in six spaces, between the five Municipal Galleries and the Atelier-Museu Júlio Pomar (from April 16th to May 5th).

Throughout April there is still much more to see, read, listen to, talk to and participate in, such as the Politics Festival, which returns to Cinema São Jorge, this year with Intervention as its central theme; and the launch of a publication with the works and reflections of Júlio Pomar on April 25th. But also to smell, A Garden of Carnations, at Galeria Quadrum, planted to bloom on April 25th.

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