From 14 to 23 November 2025, Palma and various venues across the Balearic Islands once again became fertile ground for sound and visual experimentation with a new edition of the ME_MMIX Festival. Invited by its artistic director, Mateu Malondra, I attended the sessions on the 14th and 15th for Revista Ritmo. A festival where electronic and instrumental music, sound art, visual arts and documentary film engage in a hierarchy-free dialogue, hybridising with one another. With a firm commitment to emerging creation, ME_MMIX consolidates itself as a platform for encounter and aesthetic radicality, reaffirming Palma as a strategic cultural hub in the Mediterranean and as a candidate for European Capital of Culture 2031.

At 10:00 came the welcome, and at 11:30 a meeting with Andreas Brehmer and Marion Kalter for audiovisual professionals, photographers, musicologists and cultural managers. The last activity of the morning was an event titled “From Inclusion to Co-responsibility: Festivals Designed With and For Everyone.” The afternoon was dedicated to concerts, but in a very original manner. Before the performances, the documentary Notations (Pierre Boulez) by Marion Kalter was screened. This unusual opening already revealed Malondra’s highly innovative approach, beginning with formats that connect music with the audiovisual realm—so crucial in our hyper-mediated societies. The film was made on the occasion of Boulez’s centenary, celebrated in 2025, and ME_MMIX wished to join this worldwide commemoration.

The film is based on an extensive interview conducted with the composer-conductor in 2005 at IRCAM, where Boulez reviews his life, his musical thought and his collaborations with some of the most influential figures of the 20th century. From this material Kalter constructs a portrait through precise and rhythmic editing, interweaving the musician’s voice with the photographs she shows him—images she herself took of Boulez over nearly three decades. As if recalling Proust’s “lost time,” Boulez, upon seeing the photos, reminisces about friends and acquaintances, almost always with praise (Daniel Barenboim, Arditti Quartet, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Luciano Berio, Elliott Carter, Paul Sacher, etc.), though sometimes with “kind” criticisms. The French composer—who, like few in contemporary music, acquired unmatched power and reputation—is sharp and elegant when describing John Cage as “a strange character” with great ideas but few tools. Boulez is especially critical of Cage’s indeterminacy, the complete opposite of Boulez’s hyper-structuralist aesthetics. Of Luigi Nono he says “the ascetic communist,” a sort of monk-composer devoted to politics, while praising Nono’s highly independent avant-garde and experimental spirit, as opposed to the conventionalism of socialist realism. And possibly his harshest remarks are aimed at his “archenemy” Xenakis, about whom Boulez, barely concealing it, says that Xenakis resented him because Boulez had been granted important positions (such as the directorship of IRCAM) that Xenakis apparently also desired, and therefore “envied” him.

The resulting film is an intimate, multi-layered reflection in which word, image and music converse, highlighting in the soundtrack fragments from the Douze Notations pour piano, performed in 1992 by Boulez himself. Far from a conventional biopic, the film presents itself as a meditation on memory, time and creation. Shot in superb black and white (remember that the director is also the photographer behind the images shown to Boulez), the film succeeds in creating a highly original and meticulously crafted document. Notations was a beautiful film making its Spanish premiere with the director present, underscoring the festival’s distinctive curatorial vision. In a different approach, another film made for Boulez’s centenary should be mentioned: Pierre Boulez – Der Weg ins Unbekannte, directed by Thomas von Steinaecker.

After the screening, a brief discussion took place with Marion Kalter and Mateu Malondra, who then explained the festival’s activities. The first concert of the afternoon, for clarinet and live electronics, was performed by Rafel Caldentey and Sebastian Schottke with a programme perfectly suited to the occasion: Sequenza IXc for bass clarinet by Luciano Berio—who also appeared in the previous film and whose centenary is likewise being celebrated this year—and Boulez’s Dialogue de l’ombre double for clarinet and electronics. The first work, highly virtuosic and exploring numerous bass clarinet techniques and registers, emphasises the “study” nature Berio conceived for his Sequenze, a kind of Liszt-like “transcendental etudes,” pushing instrumental virtuosity to extremes while also probing the composer’s own language. Caldentey’s performance was spectacular, especially given the work’s length and difficulty.

In striking contrast, Dialogue de l’ombre double centres on small motifs that transform into multiple mirrors—or rather, shadows. Also highly virtuosic, though more focused in material and register than the previous work, the piece stands out particularly for its electronics, based on pre-recorded clarinet material. These recordings, as the performer gratefully noted, were made by several female students from the Superior Conservatory, highlighting both the pedagogical dimension of this concert and of the festival as a whole. The staging was especially interesting, with carefully prepared lighting. When the electronics imitated the clarinet’s sounds, the live clarinet remained silent, and at that moment the stage lights went out, emphasising the “shadows.” When the “sonic light” returned through the live clarinet, the stage lights lit up again, creating a beautiful “dialogue” fitting perfectly with the title. The piece unfolds in a circular, motivic conversation between the live instrument and fixed electronics. Near the end, the idea of shadow leads the soloist to momentarily turn his back to the audience while sustaining a long pedal note blending with the amplified acoustic sound. The electronics gradually fade, leaving the amplified resonance alone—another concept closely related to shadow—until it touches silence. The concert ended with a warm ovation for the brilliant performances of both the soloist and the sound technician.

The next concert was given by violinist Gregor Dierck, who performed Doppelbelichtung by Carola Bauckholt, a piece for violin and electronics. The title could be translated as “double exposure,” referring to a photographic technique (remember that Licht in German means light). This concept “dialogues” well with the previous Boulez work. The German composer’s piece explores techniques such as imitation, friction and symbiosis between instrumental sounds and environmental sounds. The work begins with very high notes that seem to move like a horse—an effect heard in other pieces by Bauckholt, rich in references to animals. In this sense, the use of extremely high registers and glissandi evokes birdsong, something also reflected in the electronics, which construct a sonic landscape reminiscent of a forest. The piece transposes the photographic phenomenon of superimposed images into the sonic domain, creating acoustic layers that blur the boundary between reality and imagination. More concretely, Dierck works with almost animal-like gestures (rubbing, crackling, murmuring), though produced through instrumental means such as harmonics, flautato bowing, overpressure, etc. This “double sonic exposure” generates a perceptual play: what is heard seems simultaneously natural and artificial, recognisable and strange. As in other works by Bauckholt, the focus lies not on melody or traditional development (which is more cyclical), but on almost microscopic observation of sound and on building an acoustic cosmos in continuous motion. Like entering a forest, sources become mixed, creating a beautiful, indecipherable mosaic. The piece ends almost by surprise, and the audience responded warmly, considering this concert a kind of extension of the previous one. The careful programming and its coherence meant that the afternoon’s activities formed a full and well-articulated arc.

The penultimate concert of the evening was by the piano duo Alter Face (Tomeu Moll-Mas and Albert Díaz), marking a high point due to their great technical skill and a programme consisting entirely of premieres. All works were composed by musicians from the Islands, highlighting the festival’s rich musical and social fabric. The first piece, for piano four hands and electronics, titled 89 esquerdes d’ombra (“89 Cracks of Shadow”) and composed by Francesc Llombart (Maó, Menorca, 1987), was characterised by a rich, shifting texture (like a sea wave). Bursts of sound through fast scales and arpeggios were combined with percussive ostinati in the piano’s high register, plus flexible electronics once again handled by Sebastian Schottke. Particularly interesting was the construction of pianistic material in small groups separated by silences, giving the fragments a sculptural quality that accumulated gradually. The work ended, and the composer came onstage to greet, visibly pleased with Alter Face’s excellent performance.

The next piece, NUR by Francesc Xavier Gelabert (Manacor, Mallorca, 1976), was the only work that was not a world premiere, but a European premiere, as Alter Face had first premiered it in Brazil. Inspired by mythology, its electronics created a kind of microtonal piano. The four live hands clashed with the tuning heard from the speakers, creating a vibrant and evocative tension. NUR began with a primordial, almost ritualistic sonority—like the invocation of a deity—repeated many times between long silences. The electronics and live piano, completely synchronised, led the listener into a world of sound-spirits that, though austere like a totem, gradually accelerated. The initial flashes joined into a large sonic constellation. These kaleidoscopic structures seemed to weave a geometric carpet of great beauty, reminiscent of Stockhausen’s Mantra for two pianos and electronics (ring modulators).

The sonic fabric grew increasingly complex until it burst into a large climax, broken by a massive chord that returned the piece to silence and to a static chord, more dissonant than the opening one. The work continued with further dissolutions and processes, until surprisingly more consonant sonorities appeared near the end—octaves and even seemingly tonal chords. However, this was fleeting, and the intense microtonality quickly returned. The piece dissolved gradually into silence. The composer greeted the audience and received deserved warm applause.

The third work, MEDITACIÓ 1 (meditacions incòmodes) by Mariano Torres (Eivissa, 1972), was a version for pianist and manipulator performed by Alter Face. Torres’ sonic language, rooted in modality and an introspective minimalism, was played at the keyboard by Albert Díaz. This material was expanded by Tomeu Moll-Mas through direct improvisation inside the piano, producing harmonics, frictions and unexpected sounds to conceptually expand the original work. The result was a highly interesting and convincing sonic collision. Whereas Gelabert’s piece was based on a chord, Torres’ used an intervallic motif in loop, leading the listener towards a trance-like state. The piece begins calmly, then gradually builds tension until a catharsis erupts. A second process follows, similarly shaped: in the first part Moll-Mas rubs the strings with his hands and nails; in the second, he uses percussion mallets for a more primitive sonority. Shorter than the previous piece, it created an appealing contrast in the programme, revealing that a single four-hand piano can produce orchestral-like timbres. It is worth noting that this and the next piece had no electronics, but as Tomeu explained, they aimed to create an “electronic-like” sound acoustically.

Finally, La mar dins un sac by Maties Far (Palma, Mallorca, 1973) was premiered. This piece develops materials already explored in Gran Mar, a work for piano six hands, electronics and orchestra premiered in 2022 by Alter Face with Llorenç Prats and the OSIB under Zsolt Nagy. The poetics of the sea—together with the work of the poet Miquel Bauçà—are among Far’s most visible influences. La mar dins un sac unfolds an exuberant sonic imagination and spectacular virtuosity. The composer uses objects placed on the harp, the frame and the piano keys to generate unusual textures that analyse the piano’s materials microscopically. The torrent of pianistic whispers characteristic of this work becomes fully audible thanks to careful amplification by sound technician Sebastian Schottke.

Beginning with the idea of a glissando across the keys, the piece moves through countless sounds produced in almost every part of the piano, demanding impressive choreography from the performers as they manage numerous techniques and movements. The piece recalls Lachenmann’s approach in works like Toccatina or Güero, but taken to even greater levels of difficulty and radicality. The music combines fragile percussive sounds with keyboard notes that create stark contrasts, including string scratches and many objects producing varied timbres. Extremely challenging, the piece develops through the mixing of sounds and the exploration of their similarities and contrasts, eventually dissolving into infrasound and requiring radical listening from the audience. The composer greeted the hall, and the concert was a great success, standing out as a unique proposal thanks to Alter Face’s meticulous and virtuosic work.

The 14th’s sessions closed around 22:30 with an electroacoustic atmosphere. It began with Alquimia by Núria Cunillera Salas and Sebastian Schottke, for recorded choir, percussion and live electronics, in collaboration with the University of the Balearic Islands Choir. The piece was initially acousmatic, though many percussion instruments (triangles, cymbals, timpani, tam-tam, polystyrene) could be seen on stage, seemingly activated through the speakers. Pre-recorded voices fused interestingly with the percussion. The “alchemy” transformed when six performers entered and physically activated the instruments, creating a performance over the sound installation, blurring and hybridising genres. Improvisation, electroacoustics, choir and percussion intertwined to build a sound world challenging conventions and offering new ways of understanding music and sound.

The programme continued with the electroacoustic work ||: FOREST OF BREATH :|| by Brigitta Muntendorf. Here, the only protagonists were the speakers, arranged in a circle around the audience to create a spatial and immersive reality. The title, referring to “forest,” gives a clue to the piece’s nature; “breath” reflects the sonic material from which this ritualistic, repetitive, circular work is built. The bars in the title are musical repeat signs. The tribal chant Muntendorf constructs from breath and voice culminated in a grand sonic Stonehenge, echoing the previous work in many ways. From nothing emerged an immense whirlwind that cyclically returned to its origin. The ritual of the piece and of the ME_MMIX concert ended successfully, allowing the audience to appreciate the diversity of musical creation and the richness of contemporary sound art.

The next day, the “mix” spirit radicalised even further, but before that—and emphasising the festival’s pedagogical dimension—the first activity at 10:00 was a meeting with Ensemble TEC. In an open dialogue, several members of the Ensemble gathered: Maties Far (composer and organiser), Carlota Cáceres (percussion), Llorenç Prats (piano); plus external participants Jordi Alomar (musicologist and cultural manager), Juan Lluís Escrivà (composer) and the artistic director of ME_MMIX, Mateu Malondra. They discussed major topics, such as musician associations, professionalisation, funding management, institutional collaborations, conservatory traditionalism, etc. They also examined concrete situations, such as the impact of the 2008 crisis and its consequences, which caused the closure of several festivals and the elimination of public funding—critical issues in the fragile ecosystem of contemporary music. In conclusion, it was a revealing meeting that highlighted seldom-discussed yet crucial aspects for ensuring the survival of new music in society.

Continuing with the pedagogical aspect, at 11:30 a family activity called ZULU-ZULU took place, linked to a contemporary creation project developed by students of the flute and composition departments of the Balearic Islands Higher Conservatory of Music, in collaboration between ME_MMIX and the CSMIB. Music ranging from rock to electronics reached a diverse audience, sparking curiosity about experimental sound practices far from conventional classical music.

The last morning activity, also aimed at strengthening social and professional networks, was a Pitching/Speed Meeting event to generate exchanges of experiences and creative approaches, not only among artists, but also musicians, programmers and producers. The festival hopes these sessions spark new collaborations and that this year’s edition becomes the seed for future ones.

The afternoon concerts began again, this time quite different from the previous day. A rich mixture of musics invited the audience to draw connections from progressive rock to free improvisation, contemporary composition and electroacoustics. Against the “ghettos” that sometimes form in festivals devoted exclusively to contemporary music, ME_MMIX broadens its horizons and invites other genres. The aim is for audiences less accustomed to contemporary creation to discover it naturally by establishing bridges with styles and languages they find familiar. In this way, the festival fosters new connections, enriches listening and creates spaces where distinct sensibilities can meet and dialogue. It is no coincidence that the hall remained full all afternoon, with the audience applauding each concert enthusiastically.

The first group of the afternoon was Geometrical Sardine, formed by Jaume Rosselló (electric guitar), Joan Roca (bass) and Pep Aspas (drums). With their instruments and without vocals, they blended genres to create very original music: from psychedelic to experimental, progressive rock to alternative jazz. They performed pieces from their recent album and others that mixed themes as disparate as they were fascinating, ranging from Camarón de la Isla to videogames, passing through soundscapes inspired by remote geological eras or jungles. All of this created an improbable yet coherent synergy, without renouncing the trio’s innovative, unconventional and unpredictable essence. The addition of Toni Cobos, with a visual component based on AI-generated images projected and synchronised with the music, created an impactful stage experience.

Following them came another trio from the jazz world, but with a different aesthetic: K12, made up of Gori Matas (piano), Marko Lohikari (double bass) and Teo Salvà (drums). A typical jazz instrumentation, but in this proposal, enhanced by Sebastian Schottke’s live electronics, the aim was to break away from established forms and create a genuine free improvisation in a single continuous arc. The tension between jazz’s melodic and tonal patterns and the amorphous noise associated with experimental free improvisation remained present throughout the concert. Although in trio formation, the ensemble frequently shifted to duo or solo textures. While the percussion, accustomed to noise, seemed very comfortable, the piano focused on creating harmonies and often jazz-like melodies that brought a more “classical” air to the sonic experimentation. The double bass mediated between typical jazz pizzicatos, strikes on the instrument’s wood and bowing below the bridge, creating noise-based sonorities that broke away from melodic or harmonic frameworks. These tensions were interesting and formed a bridge between the previous concert and the next one, performed by Ensemble TEC: Xabier Casal (saxophones), Esteban Belinchón (cello), Carlota Cáceres (percussion), Llorenç Prats (piano), Javier Martí (performer), presented by Maties Far.

Ensemble TEC’s programme offered a dynamic journey through contemporary creation, with various versions of Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Tierkreis interwoven with works by Simon Steen-Andersen, Kaija Saariaho, Elena Mendoza and Elena Rykova, plus the world premiere of Release by Javier Martí. With a flexible formation (saxophone, cello, percussion, piano and performers), the ensemble unfolded a plural sonic landscape committed to contemporary creation. The works were introduced by Maties Far, who highlighted two key concepts for understanding the concert: melody and gesture. While Stockhausen in the 1950s and 60s broke away from melody through serialism, in the 1970s—and specifically in Tierkreis—he turned toward a kind of “neo-modalism.” These zodiac melodies, interspersed among the concert’s pieces in versions produced by students of the Higher Conservatory, invite questions about real authorship and reflections on the boundaries of musical creation.

In Steen-Andersen’s Next to beside Besides, the musicians’ gestures appear in all their rawness, almost mechanical. Noise-based, precisely calculated music is hybridised with a simple yet subtle video projecting the light of a flashlight as a luminous gesture, coherently dialoguing with the sound. The next work, very different but also centred on performer gesture, was Prés by Kaija Saariaho, one of the most renowned composers and describable as a “neo-romantic spectralist.” Her composition for solo cello and live electronics explores the instrument’s timbral and expressive potential through techniques such as harmonics, glissandi, pizzicati and string friction. Far from traditional melodic or rhythmic development, the piece focuses on evolving textures and resonances, amplified by electronic processing—brilliantly performed by Schottke—to create a dense, immersive sonic landscape. Each calculated gesture turns the cello into its own universe, offering a technical-expressive challenge to the performer and a contemplative experience to the listener. Esteban Belinchón delivered an excellent rendition warmly received by the audience.

The next work, Fremdkörper/variationen by Elena Mendoza, a Spanish composer based in Germany, is for cello, piano, percussion and performer, exploring the relationship between sound, gesture and space. Instruments are used beyond traditional techniques—through strikes, rubbings, harmonics—creating complex textures, while the performer adds gestural and theatrical elements expanding the visual dimension. Theatre is part of Mendoza’s aesthetic in many works, including this one performed by TEC. Organised into variations, the piece continually transforms through timbral exploration and sonic blending. For example, the cello’s sound seems to emanate from the piano strings; the percussionist’s strike resembles the cello’s pizzicato. The result is a series of timbral mirrors culminating in a clearly theatrical scene. A glass, first struck by the percussionist, eventually “breaks away,” and the performer uses it to drink, clean and rub it, opening a field of relationships between sound cause and effect, or between signifier and signified. The title Fremdkörper (“foreign body”) already metaphorically suggests a disruptive element within the work.

The final piece of the concert radicalised everything further. Súbito dodo by Elena Rykova is a work for five performers who abandon traditional instruments to create one specifically for the piece. Using cables activated by rubbing them with a coin, bows, an egg whisk and other objects, they produce metallic, machine-like sonorities. This performance took place on a table and was broadcast live on screen, magnifying details impossible to see from the audience and highlighting the work’s highly visual and choreographic aspects. The concert concluded by demonstrating the ensemble’s great skill and excellent performance in a diverse and demanding programme.

To end the evening—and almost as a surprise immediately after the applause—the acousmatic premiere of Dialectes Marins by Juan Lluís Escrivà was heard. The title already suggests the sonic material: distorted roars (like whale calls) travelling through the speakers spatially, immersing the listener in a vast musical ocean. The very low frequencies also transported the listening experience to another dimension. It is no coincidence that these sessions take place late at night, when perception changes and culminates a day of diverse musical experiences.

The sonic textures Escrivà composed created a sound world that, while having cinematic connections, was never merely effect-driven; instead, it was treated with great subtlety. Near the end, much more melodic and “celestial” moments appeared, of great beauty, seeming to lead the listener to a “dialect from beyond.” The day ended brilliantly with this immersive, transcendental experience, highlighting Mateu Malondra’s original curatorial vision. By including contrasting aesthetic proposals, the festival’s director generates sparks in their differences, igniting curiosity and intelligence. The creativity and success of ME_MMIX undoubtedly promise many future editions equally surprising and compelling.