The Symphonic Work of Kiko Argüello with the Neocatechumenal Way Orchestra conducted by Tomáš Hanus
Jubilee 2025
On Sunday, June 1, 2025, at 7:00 p.m., at the Auditorium “Parco della Musica Ennio Morricone”, Sala Santa Cecilia, Kiko Argüello will present his Symphonic Work. A concert on the occasion of the Jubilee of Families, in which the Neocatechumenal Way Orchestra, conducted by Tomáš Hanus, director of the Icelandic Symphony Orchestra, will perform for the first time, on the same evening, the two symphonic works by Kiko: “The Suffering of the Innocents” and “The Messiah”.
Spanish painter, founder of the Neocatechumenal Way together with Carmen Hernández, author of important pictorial, architectural, and sculptural works throughout the world, Kiko Argüello places his artistic vocation at the service of the Church and the Liturgy. Through painting expressed in sacred art, as a reflection of God’s light, and through music, a powerful and mysterious spiritual language, Kiko finds a way to proclaim the Gospel to contemporary man. Art, then, is conceived as an expression of beauty and as a relationship of love with God in the service of the New Evangelization.
In the Jubilee Year 2025, this event under the patronage of the Dicastery for Evangelization will be a celebration for the family. In a Europe marked by the process of secularization, threatened by atheism, afflicted by the crisis of society, culture, values, ethical and religious principles, in our complex era, with humanity wounded by the suffering of so many conflicts, “in this generation,” said Kiko Argüello during the audience with Pope Francis in 2022 for the sending of 430 families on mission, “God is calling families, in the image of the Holy Family of Nazareth, to bring the joy of God’s love to those who do not yet know it.” The family, God’s sublime work of art, shows the world the beauty of Christ and his Church.
His artistic works and writings are the expression of a new aesthetic that aims to help man raise his spirit toward God. His music, too, in a unique way, arouses profound spiritual inspirations, emotions that lead to the dimension of the mystery of God’s beauty. Musical art inspired to instill hope in the heart of man afflicted by suffering but marked by a transcendent destiny.
“The Suffering of the Innocents” is the first work Kiko composed, five movements centered on the pain of the Virgin Mary as she watches her Son being killed. It is a meditation charged with dramatic tension. The bold orchestration that runs through the score and the sobriety of the singing help us to contemplate the mystery of the suffering that pierces the soul of the Mother of Christ.
Performed for the first time in 2011 in the Holy Land, at the Domus Galilaeae on the Mount of Beatitudes (Korazín), the work has been staged in major theaters, concert halls, squares, and cathedrals around the world: Madrid Cathedral, New York Metropolitan, Chicago Symphony Hall, Berliner Philharmoniker Hall in Berlin, Gerard Behar Auditorium in Jerusalem, Suntory Hall in Tokyo, Hungarian State Opera House in Budapest, Memorial Concert in Auschwitz (broadcast on Italian television channel Rai1), Aula Pablo VI in the Vatican, Piazza Unità d’Italia in Trieste…
After completing his first symphony, Kiko began working on a second score that will be the fulfillment of a musical idea in continuity with the first. An artistic and spiritual journey that will lead him to the definitive version of a symphonic poem for piano, choir, and orchestra, “El Mesías” (The Messiah), a triptych on the passion and suffering of Christ dedicated to the martyrs.
After completing his first symphony, Kiko began working on a second score that will be the fulfillment of a musical idea in continuity with the first. An artistic and spiritual journey that will lead him to the definitive version of a symphonic poem for piano, choir, and orchestra, “El Mesías” (The Messiah), a triptych on the passion and suffering of Christ dedicated to the martyrs. Three episodes from the History of Salvation in music: Aquedá, Hijas de Jerusalén (Daughters of Jerusalem), and El Mesías, león para vencer (The Messiah, Lion to Conquer). The sacrifice of Isaac and the mystery of Abraham’s faith, the words of Christ to the women who follow him along the Via Dolorosa, the poetic words of Victorino de Pettau, a fourth-century Christian martyr who announces the Mystery of Christ, “lion” to conquer, who becomes a lamb to suffer. It premiered on November 19, 2023, at the Verdi Theater in Trieste and was broadcast on Rai5, the music and arts channel of Rai Cultura.
The concert will be broadcast live in 137 countries and will be available to view on the official website of the Neocatechumenal Way.
