Annecy Music Festival
The Fifth Annecy Classical Music Festival is approaching. During these five years that have flown by so fast, the festival has already become traditional.
I’d like to share an interesting observation from my life with you: I’ve noticed that seasons of the year sound for me like the festivals that are held during these months. And if September is Irkutsk and “Stars on Baikal” or London and “Proms”, January – “Christmas meetings” in Irkutsk, March-April - Easter Festival, June - St. Petersburg and “Stars of the White Nights”, July is Verbier, Salzburg and Ravinia, August is definitely Annecy.
Annecy is a unique place. Annecy is a great team or rather a family. There is a special atmosphere in Annecy: on one hand very home-like, on the other hand international. I, as one of the artistic directors of the festival, can't help but rejoice in the fact that we’ve managed to create the festival, which enjoys great success, and to preserve the special home-like atmosphere, owing to its fellow musicians, who come here every year.
A word of gratitude I want to Express to Pascal Escande, co-Director of the Festival in Annecy, a crazy fan of his work. In addition to Annecy he organizes the festival in the town of Auvers-sur-Oise, where in the last months of his life van Gogh lived. It was that very city where we met with Pascal, when I first arrived there after the victory in the P. I. Tchaikovsky Competition. Andrey Cheglakov has also been with us in Annecy for all these five years. Mr.Cheglakov is great Russian philanthropist, scientist, mathematician, entrepreneur and art collector who loves art, music and well versed in painting. Absolutely outstanding person, in my opinion.
Our orchestra in residence is one of the best orchestras in the world, Honored Orchestra of the St. Petersburg Philharmony with Maestro Temirkanov, who also fell in love with Annecy. This is a huge success for the festival and the city, because the name of the band and the brand of the Leningrad Philharmonic society, which is in line with the Vienna, Berlin Philharmonic, the Concertgebouw, help to bring the festival to the highest international level.
The orchestra of Maestro Temirkanov also performs in Annecy with other conductors, in particular in this year's festival it will perform at the Grand Opening Concert with Zoltan Kocsis, the famous Hungarian pianist and conductor. The program includes works of F. Liszt. I look forward to this concert!
For me the fact that every year children from Irkutsk come to Annecy is a special reason for pride: every performance of these young musicians delights the audience and each time it is a triumph. We have the opportunity to see how they grow and how they become professional musicians.
This year we came up with a new format - campus orchestra, which will include not only the Siberian children, but also French, Swiss and Italian young musicians. Youth team Annecy, you might say. I look forward to their first performance with special enthusiasm. The conductor will be Fayçal Karoui.
Maestro Spivakov on the eve of his 70th anniversary with the Virtuosos of Moscow and me will perform the Piano Concerto No. 17 in G major by Mozart during this festival. I am very pleased that this year Alexander Knyazev is coming to the Festival. He is our best cellist, "heir of Rostropovich", as they call him, an absolutely incredible talent, incredible musician, who plays not only the cello, but also organ.
You will also have a chance to attend a concert of a young, but already famous, Chinese pianist, Yuja Wang, who will perform Piano Concerto №1 by D. Shostakovich with Y. Temirkanov.
The festival will be closed with our (Y.Temirkanov and I) performance of Piano Concerto N° 1 in d minor opus 15 by I. Brahms.
I want to invite you all to the Festival. Thanks to a great team of channel Medici, which turns every performance of classical music in a unique live performance, we will have an opportunity to see all the concerts online, live. You simply need to click the link just below this text to delve into the world absolutely fabulously fascinating history of the classical music festival in Annecy.
And, of course, wait for the reports directly from Annecy.
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