User:Mariaescrihuela/Feslloc

Feslloc, previously written Feslloch, is a music festival in Valencian language organized by the association Asociación Cultural Feslloc and it is made up of Benlloc City Council, Escola Valenciana and the association Associació Cultural Pitxurrull (Benlloc, Valencia, Spain). The festival is held on the second weekend of July each year since 2007 in the Valencian town of Benlloc (Plana Alta).

Coordinated by Xavier Ginés (Benlloc City Council - General Coordination) and by Voro Golfe (Escola Valenciana - Scheduling), the festival has the collaboration of the volunteers of Reviscola and the local entities involved. The City Council has been promoting the festival since 2007 and that is why they have the support of Escola Valenciana from the outset, which took over the festival as the conclusion of the annual Valencian Music Tour that it had organized since 2006. Apart from the general coordination staff, the City Council grants the municipal spaces and provides a subsidy, while Escola Valenciana contributes with its experience in promoting music in Valencian language and the human capital it has (design, programming and communication, among others).

The festival has achieved self-financing in most of the editions, compensating the losses with the profits of the previous edition. The economic impact of the festival in the town is very important, especially taking into account that the registered population is around 1,098 inhabitants. The profit estimate for local commerce is around three hundred thousand euros.

However, the Feslloc has been criticized for its "stylistic bias on the posters" and "Escola Valenciana's commitment to a very specific type of musical genre, of a festive and vindictive nature.”

In 2011, in addition to concerts by groups such as Obrint Pas, Orxata Sound System, New York Ska Jazz Ensemble or La Pato orchestra, other cultural, sports and recreational activities also took place.

In 2015, the main stage of the festival changed the location from the local sports court to the Agustí Sancho football field, in order to accommodate the expectations generated in the 2014 edition. In fact, the one held in 2015 was the most massive edition of all, with the assistance of about 14,000 people.

In 2016, the festival's ten years were commemorated with a "low profile" line-up headed by internationals such as Fermin Muguruza (Friday, with the New Orleans Basque Orkestra) and Train to Roots (Saturday, like Atupa, Auxili and Sva-ters), along with Aspencat, Pep Botifarra —with a music band— or Senior i el Cor Brutal. The choice of Muguruza as the headline of the poster did not have the expected repercussion and the sale of tickets was lower compared to the previous edition, for which Golfe described it as "bittersweet". In fact, Thursday's opening day drew more audiences than the rest: on Saturday, a large part of the audience left the venue after Auxili's performance, before that of Train to Roots. Another criticism of this edition was the little presence of female artists, despite the presence of Eva Dénia, Judit Neddermann, Pupil·les Dilatives, Herba Negra, Donallop, Mireia Vives and the female members of Pellikana, Inèrcia or Tirant lo Rock.

In 2017, the festival offered its own production, Feslloch a banda, a recital by Josep Nadal, Xavi Sarrià and Feliu Ventura, accompanied by Amor a l’Art Musical Association. From the repertoire chosen by the director Josep Sancho and by the composer Xavier Piquer, the public chose two songs by each of the singers through the festival's Facebook. The organization estimated the attendance with more than eight thousand attendees throughout the three days and highlighted the "absence of serious incidents and the great economic impact generated."

Enllaços externs

 * Web oficial del Feslloc
 * La Veu «Feslloch, la música en valencià en un país anormal, by M. Pitarch»
 * Vent d Cabylia «El Feslloch 2013: Un èxit en tots els sentits» by Vicent Baydal