A short bonus episode showcasing a few standout moments from this week's guest interview with Pep Salazar from OFFF Festival  ~

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[00:00:00] Hey, welcome to this bonus episode of the Daring Forever Podcast. This is my weekly opportunity to zoom in on a few standout moments from this week's interview to find those moments that deserve a second look and dig deeper in what makes them special. This week I spoke to Pep Salazar, who is the director of Festival in Barcelona and beyond.

 In our conversation, we went back to his own beginnings as a drama student in a small town near Barcelona, through his years building Sónar Festival 

And what it really takes to design a temporary festival city, one that now travels across Mexico, Sevilla, Montreal and future in Tallinn and other cities.

The episode published a few days ago was, was titled "Dare to Chase the Hardest Place on Earth," and it was about risk, honesty and why community, when done properly, is the hardest and most rewarding thing you can build. If you haven't checked out the full episode yet, let me share with you these four standout moments.

Quote #1

Pep: I came from a small town, but it's not small today but it was pretty small town near Barcelona.

It's called [00:01:00] Terrassa. I was born there. my parents wasn't at all about culture or creativity and I don't know why but I, really started loving theater and plays at the age of 14, And then I realized that, uh, I wanted to be an actor so I studied drama for five years. I've been four years studying drama in Barcelona and then I went to London for one year to study drama Yeah, I was remembering, uh, the other day I was doing this kind of Meisner technique, which is a repetition technique that you repeat the other one and that starts the dialogue. And that pulls me into the, you deep culture in a way and in deep creativity. And then I realized that I I wasn't an actor.

I mean, everybody can be an actor but you you need to be very lucky and you need to hang, up with people that maybe you don't want to and you need to build families that maybe you don't want to. that's the acting thing. And I realized that I was, cool in behind the scenes and then I went to the university to, I knocked to the university.

I say, "Hey, can I come back [00:02:00] to study some cultural policies and management and that kind of things?" 

As I've said it many times, I like to come not knowing much about my guests. I've been friends with Pep for nearly a decade, but I never knew that he wanted to be an actor, and I absolutely adored that revelation on, in our conversation because as you know, I always say I've got a habit of taking things to the sort of origin stories.

And Pep's one was incredible because he wouldn't strike me as an actor. He's-- He wouldn't strike me as someone who would want to do this. He's a very particular, very unique character, and it's beautifully then revealed like how he was more interested in the things behind the scenes that really showed him what happens in delivering things, whether it was from theater plays to then becoming, interested in more sort of business of, performance that led him to working with Sónar Festival and then jumping into helping OFFF.

And I guess [00:03:00] there is always a moment where our teenage years and early 20s has tried to show us some form of interest and excitement, only to realize that some people might do it better, and we might be doing things better behind the scenes. And I'm always full of praise to all of my friends who run festivals wherever else in the world, because tho-those are the true heroes.

Without them, you wouldn't, n-none of us would be on the stage per se. So yeah, it's amazing that this story started with someone who wanted to be an actor in a small city outside Barcelona

Quote #2

was, challenging in a, in a first way because first of all, as I tell you, you need to understand the context, so you also need to understand What are you working on?

Pep: And I met Hector, which is the founder of, OFFF. He founded in 2001, and Hector is a videographer, and he's a cinema maker, and he's an artist, and he needs a manager, you know? because, artists are artists, and they need to play art, and they need managers to put them, in the way to, to play art.

and the challenge [00:04:00] was to understand my reflection, but the challenge was to make it professional. not making as a something that, uh, is a side project or something that I only have passion. Because when you have a lot of passion in something, it's great, but then you can blur your view, and then you cannot build a, project that.

So I, find that moment Hector needed management at all cost because he was moving from Barcelona to Lisbon. with Sonar, I have the opportunity also to work, internationally. So I have experience of working in Germany, England, Portugal, many places.This is a great moment to highlight the need for, a solid mind that isn't too passionate about creativity. Because as Pep highlighted here, when he joined OF, Hector was the creative partner who was a cinematographer, he was a creative, and he needed someone to manage it, 

Someone who runs the business in a way that business should be run. And it reminds me of a quote from [00:05:00] Ozzy Osbourne. He said, "Look, I've never booked my own gig, because if I booked my own gig, that would make me a businessman, and I would not be a musician anymore." Well, here comes Sharon, and the rest is history.

But in our way of how we need to multitask in every way of aspect of running small business, to be just at one thing is rare and remarkable, and some people need to do it. Some people need to do that creative part really well, so people like Pep can step in and really help to run the show. The reason why I picked this quote, 'cause I just love the fact that when he says, "When you have too much passion for something, it can blur your view," and it's true.

And that's why I've chosen this. I love this.

Quote #3

And having the chance to share that ideas is something, and share the process is something that really inspires me in that moment and still inspire me. Because when you do a music festival... I've been involved in other music festivals during that period also, mostly [00:06:00] jazz. when you do music festival, what you do is, you show the final piece Jazz can be a little bit different because jazz they improvise a lot, and the improvisation in jazz is, is something that only jazz musicians and a few audiences understand.

Pep: but the other music is a finished thing, so you show the finished, project. At OFFF, we ask to show the unfinished project, or at least to show the, the process to go to that finished project. And that journey from the idea to the finished project is something that makes OFFF really, really unique.

from that moment, well, you know, maybe you know better than me, but from that moment, it's hundreds of design conferences doing, more or less the same because communities need to understand process also. the other thing this is a design conference, okay?If you've ever been to any creative festival more than once, there's this bit of a sort of audience dissonance between what's on [00:07:00] offer, what the studios would like to showcase, what the creators would like to showcase.

Because ultimately, in some cases, you've got one chance in a decade or one chance in five years to get up on a big stage and tell your story and show how things work, what you've created. And sometimes, from my perspective, you know, you can argue that some people are just happy to showcase their business because that's what they do.

And the talk might be quite narrow in a way of a audience appeal, but there is definitely some audience appeal. To some people, that might be just a, meh, a portfolio karaoke that doesn't really show much behind the scenes, because it's easy, and again, I'm gonna die on this hill.

It's easy- To believe that what you might be doing as a creative or small studio, even a big studio, that the work you do is important. Because let's go back to the previous moment, we are full of passion, and that can blur the view. [00:08:00] The question is, how much value and takeaways that it can really provide to people?

Because, it's tricky to get things right. I personally, I did my, off main stage talk in 2024, and I've decided to not show any work. I was showing behind the scenes of what it's like to be a creative, what it's like to be struggling with ambition, anxiety, insecurity, and passion all together.

You know, with this sort of cocktail of inputs. And it was quite challenging in a way of processing this like, oh, everyone's gonna be showing their beautiful work. Potentially they'll be showing, the idea of, you know, how they made the stuff. And that can test you because it's, a portfolio karaoke if you allow it to be.

So Pep's idea of actually, you know, wanting to encourage people to show what's behind the scenes is where we're gonna learn. If you had a chance to listen to my conversation with Eliza Williams, she is the editor of Creative Review, and she was very much talking about the fact, like how the [00:09:00] behind the scenes, the messy stuff, the mistakes, the failures, the discarded ideas are so much more interesting than the final piece.

So yeah, having Pep using this as a sort of motto for the festival is quite beautiful and yeah, that's where we really, really learn from one another.

Quote #4

I have a million three-minute conversations, and that's something I learned from the years to try to enjoy these short conversations because, uh, it's, uh, so stressful. And I, I find moments to enjoy from the last two, three years.

Pep: I have-- be very honest. because, the festival is going, the team is, the same. We know how to do it. of course, I'm, I'm running around all the time and looking things and, and seeing people and watching people. Then, I need to find my moments myself alone, and I like to sit in the middle of the room, and listen one or...

Not one, but not the long keynote, but maybe, I don't know, 15 minutes, 20 minutes, 10 minutes. and I try to enjoy it, and Yeah, I I always bring my family there and, you know, I try to make a family moment. having a [00:10:00] pizza and a beer and, speaking with people. 

I mean, if you've ever been to OF Festival, It's busy, it's wide. there's a lot of people, a lot of going on, multi-track events happening all the time. It's incredible, and I think as if you ever run any events of your own, own kind, even just, even just your own wedding, it just goes quick, and you try to make sure that everyone's having a good time, everything's going well.

And I love the fact that for someone with so much on his plate, with so much going on well and so much that could go wrong, it's incredible to see this man's aura in the best possible way, how he genuinely is there for every single one of those five thousand people from eighty-seven countries, genuinely caring and wanting them to have a good time.

Because as he said about Sónar, if people come happy and you wanna make them happier, and it's a huge weight on his shoulders to cater to the design and creative crowd. Because let's be honest, we are gonna [00:11:00] be n-never happy crowd. Always we, we always got opinions about how things should be better, how the lineup could be better and how this is not enough and that is not enough.

And it's a tricky part of someone trying to plan something for a year and then get it across the line to please everyone. So I do love this moment when he says, you know, "I've got one million three-minute conversations," because I think that's the best way to split someone's time, to be able to give back and show that you really value and appreciate their, presence at a festival.

 thank you for being here on this bonus episode. if you were to check out a full episode with Pep, it was a great conversation with someone I've known for a while, and I really value what he does. And yeah, that gives you a really good insight of what goes into planning and production of festival like OF and what it takes to sort of bring it around the world too.

Thank you for being here, and I'll catch you in the next episode next week