summer

Every year the sounds of fireworks popping and crackling perforate the air in Catalonia in the days leading up to Sant Joan's Eve (Nit de Sant Joan). The yearly festival culminates in a massive party on the night of 23 June, when locals celebrate the holiday by setting off mass amounts of fireworks and igniting bonfires, known in Catalan as 'fogueres'. At midnight, there is a spectacular fireworks display, marking the climax of the celebration. The bonfires of Sant Joan have special meaning for Catalan-speaking regions, and the festival is considered a Catalan national holiday. The tradition as it exists today traces its roots back to pagan rituals and coincides with the summer solstice, marking the beginning of the summer.

Barcelona's summer Festival Grec is the city’s main yearly event for theatre, dance, music, circus and other stage arts, taking place from the 1^st to the 31^st of July. On Wednesday, the Festival's Director, Ramon Simó, announced that the dance show 'Vorònia' by Catalan company La Veronal will open the event, also disclosing some of the shows in the 2015 programme. This year, the Grec will celebrate its 39^th edition and by now it has become a milestone on the European festival calendar. The event’s title is taken from its main venue: the Greek Theatre, on Montjuïc, an open-air theatre built for the 1929 Universal Exhibition. In total, last year's edition attracted 127,471 people, of which 79,254 went to see shows which required payment (79 in total).

This year, bands Oques Grasses and La iaia, singer-songwriter Sílvia Pérez Cruz and DJ Guillamino will perform in Central Park. The New York SummerStage Festival will present the 2^nd edition of 'Catalan Sounds on Tour' on 28 June, a Sunday afternoon of Catalan music at this internationally-renown festival. More than 5,000 people are expected to attend, with the event being free and running from 2.00 p.m. to 7.00 p.m. The initiative is the result of a partnership between the Institut Ramon Llull (a public body for the promotion of Catalan language and cultural production abroad) and the SummerStage Festival. Its purpose is to bring Catalan music to international audiences.

The Costa Brava-based Cap Roig's music festival will hold its 15^th edition from 10 July to 16 August. Many international and local artists will take part in the event which will start with a performance by one of the greatest exponents of British pop-rock, Sting. The following day, American singer-songwriter Ben Harper will be on stage playing with his legendary band, The Innocent Criminals, in their first tour together for seven years. The festival will also host other big names of international renown such as Lady Gaga & Tony Bennett, Rosario, Antonio Orozco, Julieta Venegas, Miguel Bosé, Passenger and Macaco. Among the featured Catalan artists will be: Mishima with Joan Miquel Oliver, Blaumut, Els Amics de les Arts and Núria Graham. The festival will end with Alejandro Sanz's performance.

Solsona's International Music Academy (AIMS) is a high level international project, which is also the first and only pedagogical music festival in Catalonia. It was created by the German cellist Peter Thiemann in order to bring together classical music students and professors of acknowledged international prestige who play in Europe's main orchestras. It is an intensive education project which takes place in a beautiful rural environment in Solsona, a town near the Pyrenees in Central Catalonia. This year, the 13^th edition of the AIMS festival is held from the 6^th to the 17^th of August, and includes the participation of 65 students from 20 different nationalities. 30 concerts have been scheduled in ten municipalities of Western and Central Catalonia.

568,231 unemployed people were registered with the Catalan Public Employment Service (SOC) this July, 1,983 less than in June, which represents a 0.35% reduction. This is 42,198 less unemployed people than in July 2013, or a 6.91% annual reduction. All of the Catalan provinces have seen a drop in unemployment over the past month. In addition, there has been an increase of Catalans registering with Social Security, a 12% rise in hiring rate and nearly all sectors in Catalonia are creating new jobs. In Spain as a whole the number of people looking for work stands at 4,419,860 people, 281,478 fewer than the previous year, which represents a 5.94% annual drop. 

On Sunday night Pet Shop Boys presented their 12^th studio album, Electric, at the summer music festival of Cap Roig, which takes place every year in Calella de Palafrugell, in the Costa Brava. The band performed an extraordinary show which included lighting effects, such as laser light beams, colourful theatrical smoke, and screen projections. Combining synthpop style, house and techno with more recent dance tracks, they have managed to evolve over the years but at the same time preserve their distinct style and continue to be revolutionary with every release. Cap Roig Festival is taking place from the 4^th of July to the 15^th of August and is combining worldwide-known artists and local musicians, such as Elton John, Bryan Adams, Placebo, James Blunt, Antonio Orozco and Els Pets, among others.

This year's edition of Barcelona's performing arts summer festival, Grec, attracted around 80,000 spectators and achieved a 58.15% capacity utilisation in the shows which require payment. According to provisional statistics, taken before the event was over, for the 79 shows that made up the summer festival there were 136,291 seats available and 67,623 tickets were sold, filling 49.61% of the potential capacity. However, overall there was total of 79,254 spectators. Last year 66,466 people attended the shows which required payment and 55,766 tickets were sold. The total number of spectators who attended the festival this year, both paying customers and those who went to free shows, amounted to 127,471 people, whilst in 2013 there were 119,000 individuals.

The 12^th Edition of Sala Montjuïc, an open air film festival which takes place every summer in Barcelona, is in full swing, and organisers estimate that over 30,000 people will have attended the event by the end of its five week running period. The festival runs from the 6^th of July to the 8^th of August and hosts evenings of live music, short films and feature length movies three times a week. An average of 2,000 spectators a night attend the screenings, which are located next to an old military castle on Montjuïc, a small hill facing Barcelona's harbour. Families can rent deckchairs, bring food and drink and enjoy watching the film whilst seated on the lawn alongside the castle's wall, in what used to be the ancient moat. This year one of the highlights included a special screening of the 1927 German classic Metropolis on the 18^th of July which was accompanied by a live jazz band.

The number of unemployed people in Catalonia has decreased by 69,800 in the second quarter of this year; the largest drop in unemployment rates in the whole of Spain and the biggest decline in the jobless population in the last 12 years. Catalonia also created 79,300 new jobs in the second quarter of this year, a rise of 2.68% in comparison to the first quarter. This means that the total unemployment rate in Catalonia has dropped by nearly 2 percentage points since March 2014, falling from 22.1% to 20.22%. Spain as a whole has also registered a drop in unemployment of 310,400 people, meaning the number of jobless citizens is down to 24.47% of the total active population.

FC Barcelona has opened a new quality gastronomic space with exclusive views of the Barça's Stadium, as part of the Camp Nou Experience tour. From this week and until mid-August, the first tier of the stadium is converted a space where visitors can enjoy quality cuisine with a privileged panoramic view of the ground. This is just one of the many new attractions that FC Barcelona has prepared so that people visiting the club this summer can enjoy the most complete leisure and catering experience possible. In this space, apart from a wide range of Damm beers, including the beer created in collaboration with Catalan chef Ferran Adrià and the team from El Bulli called Inedit, visitors can enjoy hot and cold tapas, desserts and ice creams.

89 beaches and 24 marinas in Catalonia are among those sharing the highest quality standards in Europe, since they have received a blue flag. This award is given for the quality of the water, the cleanness of the environment, easy access for people with mobility problems, the security services and other indicators. Last year, 90 beaches received a blue flag while this year Catalonia received one award less. Beaches on the Costa Brava kept their 28 blue flags, those on the Costa Daurada and the Ebro Delta also kept their 38 awards, but the coast of Barcelona went from 24 to 23 quality awards. Spain has received a total of 573 blue flags for its beaches and 108 for its marinas, a record, with 23 more beaches and 11 more marinas on the list. In this way, Spain continues to top the list among 48 states and 51 territories.

At Spanish level, unemployment increased both in monthly and annual terms. Catalonia is the Autonomous Community with the largest annual unemployment drop in absolute terms and the second highest in relative terms. The number of people registered as unemployed in Catalonia at the end of September dropped by 11,546 individuals compared to figures from a year ago, representing a 1.83% annual decrease. However, in monthly terms, registered unemployment increased by 1.51%, with 9,243 more jobseekers. September is a month with a traditional unemployment increase due to the end of summer season contracts. Last September’s unemployment increase was the lowest since 2008.

The 51^st edition of the International Festival of Porta Ferrada, located in the Costa Brava town of Sant Feliu de Guíxols, closed its doors with an average attendance of 91%. The event contained 21 music, theatre and dance performances, which had a total attendance of 11,105 people, 10,296 who paid for tickets and 890 going to the free events on offer. 6 shows were complete sell-outs: 5 of the 10 in the Espai Port (the main stage of the festival), and the ‘Concerts per a nadons’ (Concerts for babies). Albert Mallol, Artistic Director of the Porta Ferrada festival, told the CNA that it is important try to find new venues to be added to the iconic locations that already exist in order to increase the amount of musical and theatre performances.

Barcelona’s famous annual street festival, ‘Festa Major de Gràcia’ kicked-off on Wednesday evening with streets intricately decorated by neighbours and live music being played well in to the night. The event, in its 197^th year, draws an estimated 1.5 million visitors and has activities for all ages including: firework displays, ‘castellers’ - Catalan human towers, decorated streets and open air concerts taking place in 47 stages. It was traditionally a religious festival for locals of the neighbourhood, but for the last five decades it has become popular with Catalonians. Furthermore, in recent years, foreigners have also discovered it. Each year the festival begins on the 15^th of August and lasts for six days.