The pirate sails of 'Mar i Cel' are unfurled in Barceloneta in front of 30,000 people.

A radical change of pace took place this Wednesday on Barcelona's Sant Sebastià beach, thanks to Mar i Cel, the Albert Guinovart musical launched by Dagoll Dagom four decades ago and which has remained firmly entrenched in the imagination of many Catalans. After the international turn that Clàssica a la Platja took last year, when Gustavo Dudamel conducted the Liceu Orchestra in a program of John Williams soundtracks, the popular beachfront event in Barceloneta has shifted towards local fare this year, with this focus on the romantic drama that Àngel Guimerà wrote in 1888 and that Guinovart set to music a hundred years later, in 1988.

Shortly before 9 p.m., the backstage of the stage that the Liceu, the OBC (Spanish Association of Ballets), and the Palau de la Música build every summer on Sant Sebastià beach, as part of the Barcelona Obertura festival and with the Hotel Vela as a backdrop, is this time a hive of activity with singers and actors in period costume. There are well-muscled pirates... enough to field a whole football team. They are about to recreate the story of an impossible 17th-century love between a Muslim captain of a pirate ship whose parents were murdered by the Christian army during the expulsion of the Moriscos, and the daughter of the viceroy of Valencia...

Dozens of mouths move, intoning these verses from the 'Pirates' Anthem' with epic seafaring spirit.

The Liceu Orchestra kicks off the evening with the opening of Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream . There are still bathers in the water and an army of surfers lulling themselves along the calm waters: the board will be their special seat. The sand has been occupied for hours by the public, who claim every square inch as their own with sarongs, beach chairs... even bicycle seats are used to accommodate those 250 meters of stretch toward the Hospital del Mar. According to the organizers, there are around 30,000 people, just like last year.

“There are some clouds approaching here... I don't know what to think,” a glum boomer comments sullenly near the Barcelona Swimming Club. But no, the afternoon's muggy weather won't turn into a summer storm. The crowd wouldn't have let this spoil the great symphonic festival. They've come here to sing. And they wait patiently for the massive karaoke moment, when the lyrics of the chorus of the Pirates' Anthem , that Barcelona Broadway song that everyone knows, appear on one of the screens flanking the stage.

“Les veles s'inflaran, / el vent ens portarà / como un cavall debocat por les ones.”

Dozens of voices move, intoning with epic seafaring spirit these verses that remain etched in the DNA of so many generations. But they are barely audible; they can't compete with the amplification. Guinovart, participating in the event from the piano, will confess that it's always an exciting moment: today even more so.

When the anthem ends, thousands of people applaud in gratitude, while some foreigners get up and leave, having seen the accomplice slip away. Others leave, having had enough.

Àngels Gonyalons and Pep Cruz appear on stage at every turn, providing background information. There's no pirate ship here, but the sea breeze adds to the atmosphere. Guimerà's work speaks in blank decasyllabic verse (without rhyme) of the empathy and compassion of two young souls ready to fall in love. All in a declamatory and emphatic style that fits so well with certain musicals, or at least this one. More and more applause follows the love duet between Said and Blanca, performed by the handsome and talented Jordi Garreta and Alèxia Pascual.

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If in Great Britain –the queen of the musical– a curious political step has now been taken which consists of denying the Christian calendar and giving another meaning to its syllables in the interest of a religious neutrality that does not offend members of other creeds –from BC and AD ( before Christ and anno domini ) they have passed to BCE and CE ( before common era and common era )–, on the beach of Barceloneta it makes a lot of sense not to forget history at all and to recreate the possible reality of Muslims and Christians finding a new religion in love and poetry, above the conventions of their respective cultures.

“Blanca’s love is not for me and my beloved, she has to flee!” Violins. Piano. Wave of musical passion. More excited applause. Said dies with a gunshot, she commits suicide with the dagger... and both commend themselves “to the sea, to the sky.”

“This is a story that speaks to us of the intolerance and misunderstanding between the two worlds, East and West,” concludes Pep Cruz in his baritone voice. “We must continue to strive; we can never abandon the fight for peace.”

The moral receives its fitting round of applause. And so does the farewell to all this from the iconic Dagoll Dagom, who this Sunday take the stage for the last time with the final staged performance of Mar i Cel at the Victòria. The audience appreciates every syllable of Guimerà's verses.

The four cameras distributed around the stage behave differently this year. Director Cordelila Alegre and her assistant Paula Alonso weren't so focused on the score this time, but rather "on the narrative of what's happening." The Liceu Choir and Orchestra, conducted by Sergi Cuenca, thus relinquish the spotlight, although the cheers are shared by everyone. Even more so after the encore: the Pirates' Anthem is now sung by thousands of voices, impossible to gauge how many. And with a lump in their throats, the audience files forward. Today, even more so, with the OBC and the Orfeó Català.