Capuchos Festival 2026
Loves & Humors
Welcome to the Capuchos Festival 2026!
After five editions of the Capuchos Festival which, since its revival in 2021, have established it as an event of excellence and a space for dialogue between cultures, times, and artistic languages, we now propose a reflection on what is most intimate and universal to us: loves and humors, affections and states of mind.
Under the theme “Love & Humors”, the Capuchos Festival 2026 draws inspiration from the duality and complementarity between love – in its many human and spiritual forms – and the “humors” of the soul, those subtle movements that oscillate between lyricism and irony, passion and invention, devotion and laughter.
Between May 23 and June 24, Almada once again becomes the stage for one of the country’s most important cultural events. The concerts will take place at the Convento dos Capuchos, the spiritual home of the Festival, as well as in other venues across the city, such as the Teatro Municipal Joaquim Benite, the Auditório Fernando Lopes-Graça, and the Parque da Paz, where an open-air opera gala will be held for the first time.
This edition features several international highlights: the return of the outstanding Paris Orchestra “Consuelo”, performing in the opening concert; the 30th-anniversary show of the acclaimed Austrian septet Mnozil Brass, often described as the “Monty Python of classical music”; concerts by the Leipzig Quartet, regarded as one of the world’s finest string quartets, and by the award-winning vocal group SLIXS, making their debut in Portugal. The Festival will also welcome world-renowned soloists such as the singers Anna Samuil, Peter Sonn and Mandy Fredrich, the violinists Viviane Hagner and Diana Tishchenko, the cellists Christian Poltéra, Victor Julien-Laferrière and Kyril Zlotnikov, the clarinetist Pascal Moraguès, and the pianist Eldar Nebolsin.
National participation is represented by leading names such as the Metropolitan Orchestra of Lisbon, conducted by Pedro Neves, DSCH Shostakovich Ensemble, in collaboration with the actress Maria Rueff, the Officium Ensemble, conducted by Pedro Teixeira, the pianist Nuno Vieira de Almeida and the actress Rita Blanco, among others. Also noteworthy are two concerts bringing together jazz and fado, featuring the award-winning singer Maria Mendes, who has been based in the Netherlands for several years, as well as the return to the Festival of pianist Júlio Resende and guitarist Bruno Chaveiro. True to its vocation, the Festival continues to be a platform for emerging talents, including in this edition the flutist Sónia Pais, the singer Raquel Mendes, the harpsichordist Rafaela Salgado, and the Almada-born theorbist Mariana Santos.
In 2026, the now emblematic Capuchos Talks, curated by Carlos Vaz Marques, are dedicated to the centenary of the death of Camilo Pessanha, the 300th anniversary of the publication of “Gulliver’s Travels”, and to a literary reflection on the Festival’s theme.
Other parallel activities enrich the programme, such as the pre-concert talks, entitled Capuchos Preludes; the Capuchos Walk, in the Protected Landscape of the Fossil Cliff of Costa da Caparica; the Guided Visit to the historical heritage of the Convento dos Capuchos; and the Capuchos Masterclasses, intended for music students.
Com especial entusiasmo, apresentamos, pelo segundo ano consecutivo, a iniciativa Opera for Children, desta feita com a The Magic Flute, de Mozart, numa produção dirigida por António Wagner Diniz.
The Capuchos Festival 2026 is made possible thanks to the support, first and foremost, of the Almada City Council, the patron “la Caixa” Foundation, in collaboration with BPI, and the Directorate-General for the Arts. Our thanks also go to the partners Almada Theatre Company, El Corte Inglés Cultural Department and RTP Antena 2.
The Capuchos Festival 2026 spans eras and borders, between the sacred and the profane, the classical and the popular, the Baroque and jazz, Romanticism and contemporary music. “Amores & Humores” is, ultimately, a portrait of the human condition: we love, suffer, dream, ironize, celebrate. Music – perhaps the subtlest of the arts – can convey all these states with a truth that transcends words and returns us to the essence of feeling.
We invite you to join us on this journey of emotions at the Capuchos Festival 2026 – where love and humor intertwine, and art leads us to the depth and beauty of life.
