Barcelona Metropolitan Magazine Podcasts

We’re back from our winter break, and we’re starting the 2026 season with a very special guest. Nando Cruz has been a music journalist since the late 1980s. He has contributed to everything from specialty music magazines (Popular 1, Rockdelux), to mainstream newspapers (El Diaro, El Periodico) and from regional television programs to local radio broadcasts. In recent years, he has become infamous...

This month on the Metropolitan Culture Corner, we go behind the scenes with Chris White. Born in Canton, Mississippi, and now based in Barcelona, Chris is an artist, poet, writer, and immigration attorney. She takes her artistic inspiration from the rhythms of blues, gospel, and jazz, and her work in painting, poetry, and textiles weaves together personal experiences with collective narrative. At...

For our last interview of 2025, we go behind the scenes with third-generation art dealer Alex Yamet. Alex's grandfather, Irving "Sonny" Yamet, was one of the first American art dealers to introduce European prints to the United States after World War II, many of which were acquired from legendary workshops in Paris and beyond, such as Mourlot and Maeght, where artists like Picasso, Chagall, Miró,...

We interview researcher and professor Francisco José Eiroa-Orosa. He completed a European doctorate in Clinical Psychology and Psychiatry at the University of Hamburg and the Universitat de Barcelona. After stays in Dresden and Montevideo, he held teaching positions at the universities of Edinburgh and East London, a Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowship at Yale University and a Ramón y Cajal fellowsh...

This month, we interview journalist and world traveler Alicia Escribano. Immersed in the world of radio and television since she was 17, she has since developed an extensive career in various media outlets. She is known for hosting television and radio cultural programs, such as her long-running interview program Barcelonautes on 25TV, reporting on everything from political debates to cultural sho...

This month we speak with bluesman, painter and sculptor Richard White. Born in Philadelphia, Richard has performed concerts all over the U.S. and Europe before finally making Tarragona his home. He has become a fixture in the Catalan blues scene, from organizing independent blues festivals to recording and releasing his own work. He is also a painter and sculptor with international exhibitions to...

In this episode of the Metropolitan Culture Corner we go behind the scenes with Lulú Txispún: burlesque dancer, teacher and festival organizer extraordinaire. She has traveled the world performing, and even serving as a judge at international burlesque events. She has also taught burlesque since 2013, and is the co-founder of the Barcelona Burlesque Meeting and Festival. Joining her in this interv...

This month on the Metropolitan Culture Corner, we interview Chris Reilly, former chair of the Barcelona chapter of Democrats Abroad. If you’ve seen previous installments of this monthly interview series, then you know that we usually go behind the scenes with someone from the world of the arts. However, culture is multifaceted, and we wanted to speak with someone who is deeply involved in a differ...

We interview Esther Gimeno Miró. She is a computational linguist, conversational AI specialist, technology project manager and educator who has worked for multinational tech companies on the development of projects such as conversational assistants like Siri and Alexa, and large language models, or the AI programming that makes programs like ChatGPT possible. Esther is also an independent musician...

This month on the Metropolitan Culture Corner, we go behind the scenes with Yodé Olubajo. Born in London, raised in Lagos, he later lived in Venice, where he was known for his cabaret performances and parties. He speaks four languages—English, Yoruba, Italian and Spanish—and is known for his fun, flamboyant personality and style. He later moved to Barcelona, and in 2022, he created the jazz club a...

In our first interview of 2025, we go behind the scenes with Laura Avery, events organizer and co-founder of local non-profit organization Fashion Cares. Laura was born in the UK, but has made Barcelona her home for the past ten years. She was an English teacher in London, Lisbon, and Santander, until she made a career change and decided to spend the next fifteen years in fashion print media in Lo...

We go behind the scenes with director, screenwriter and editor Àlex Lora. His short films, documentaries and feature-length fiction works often address social issues related to identity, immigration, disability and youth, never shying away from tough or controversial subject matter. Lora’s works have been screened multiple times at the Sundance Film Festival, as well as many of the most prestigiou...

This month we speak with Tarek Fresno, a Barcelona native, music aficionado, world traveler, and bartender at the historic Bar Marsella in the neighborhood of El Raval for seventeen years. Founded in 1820, Marsella is the oldest bar in the entire city; generations ago, it was Ernest Hemingway’s favorite hangout, and a hot spot for artists and intellectuals of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Dal...

Welcome back to the Metropolitan Culture Corner after our summer break! We start off the 2024 fall season with an interview with film producer and visual artist Mara Adina. Born in Transylvanian, Romania, she now splits her time between London and Barcelona. Together with her sister, director Ilinca Calugareanu, she started the film and documentary production company Vernon Films in 2012. Their fi...

This month on the Metropolitan Culture Corner, we go behind the scenes with soprano and musicologist Dr. Patricia Caicedo, whose academic and creative work centers on Latin American and Iberian art song. She regularly gives lectures and master classes at music conferences and universities around the world, has released 11 albums, and has published multiple books as well as scholarly editions of sc...

This month on the Metropolitan Culture Corner, we interview soul singer Clarence Bekker, known as one of the most dynamic and explosive front men in all of Spain. Over the years, he has been a part of a number of notable musical projects, from Swinging Soul Machine to Barcelona’s own 08001, to the international musical project and non-profit organization Playing for Change. This last one took him...

Our guest this month is singer, songwriter and guitarist Carlos Mendoza. Born in Caracas, Venezuela, he has been a Barcelona resident for several decades. He moved here with the other members of one of his bands, a rock group called Luz Verde. Since then, he has been nominated for a Latin Grammy for his work with them; they have released seven albums, and have legions of fans around the Spanish-sp...

Our guest this month is Ukrainian artist Natalia Revoniuk. While she splits her time between Ukraine and the UK, she was just in Barcelona, exhibiting her work as a part of the 2024 Woman’s Essence international art showcase, where she was one of the recipients of the Woman Art Award, which highlights notable female visual artists from all over the world. Natalia was born in Lviv, Ukraine, and mov...

We go behind the scenes with documentary film and television director, producer, editor, cameraman and much more, Marcel Llorens. Born in Barcelona, Marcel’s love of all things cinema was sparked by watching old movies with his father. He studied audiovisual communication at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona and the Institut Ramon Llull, and went on to work on publicity shoots as a freelancer...

This month on the Metropolitan Culture Corner, we interview publicist, music journalist, author and poet Alicia Rodríguez. As a music publicist, she has represented some of Spain's top artists (Nat Simons, Elefantes, A Contra Blues) and has promoted tours by world-renowned international artists such as Van Morrison, Simple Plan, The Jayhawks, Jackson Browne, Yes, Lucinda Williams and many others....

Born in Russia and based in Barcelona for the past seven years, Julia Buruleva's work combines photography, videography, installation and performance. The way she plays with the scenery, props, lighting effects and other elements creates a surreal world filled with contrasts and symbolism. This is true whether she’s setting up a fashion shoot or a commercial shoot for an advertisement for a major...

In this first interview of the new year, we go behind the scenes with visual artist and jewelry maker, Stéphanie Barbié. Born in Ages, in France, she has lived in Barcelona since 2004 and opened her current studio space in Gràcia in 2016. A jeweler by training, but a lover of interior decoration, design, art and anthropology, she decided to combine her passions by creating “jewelry” that goes beyo...

This month on the Metropolitan Culture Corner we’ll be exploring a different facet of what makes up human culture: health and overall wellness with naturopath, acupuncturist and nutritionist Laia Bramona. Laia’s work involves helping her patients relieve their physical pain, digestive issues, hormonal imbalances, as well as manage stress, depression and anxiety. In 2002, she began her training in...

We interview blues guitarist, singer and songwriter Santos Puertas. Originally from the Catalan town of Sant Just Desvern, he spent time in Texas, North Carolina and other parts of the US, absorbing the language of blues, country and folk music. He has an almost encyclopedic knowledge of American roots music, and has gained the respect and admiration of top musicians in the genre. While he has col...

In this episode of MCC we interview model, actress and stunt woman, Helena Mankowska. Originally from Sopot, Poland, she has made her home in Barcelona for the past several years. Since then, Helena has appeared in commercials and ad campaigns, as well as various short films and music videos. She was the stunt double for actress Mila Jovovich of The 5th Element and Resident Evil fame in Jovovich’s...