PRESS RELEASE
The 57th BEMUS brings a rich musical programme to the Belgrade audience and an exclusive accompanying programme in the form of masterclasses
At the press conference held on the occasion of the upcoming 57th Belgrade Music Festival at the RTS Club, the attendees were addressed by Olja Jacobs, programme selector and chairperson of the event board, Jelena Milašinović, public relations manager of the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, and Aleksandra Paladin, assistant executive director of the RTS Music Production.
The selector introduced us to the rich programme of the 57th BEMUS, the main programme of which consists of 10 concerts, which we will have the opportunity to listen to from 16 to 25 October in Belgrade.
The BEMUS opening ceremony will feature the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, which is returning to this festival after a short break, and the programme will include Giacomo Puccini's Capriccio sinfonico and Divertimento concertante for double bass and orchestra and the Suite from the ballet La Strada, composed by Nino Rota. It is not surprising that Italian music is at the opening ceremony, given that the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra will be led for the first time by the world-renowned Italian conductor Carlo Ponti, and the soloist on double bass will be Strahinja Mitrović. This musical spectacle is scheduled for 16 October, at 8 p.m., at the Ilija M. Kolarac Endowment, with the support of the Italian Cultural Institute.
The following day, 17 October, the Vojvodina Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Aleksandar Marković, will perform with virtuoso pianist Andrey Gugnin, who will perform as a soloist in the popular Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini for piano and orchestra by Sergei Rachmaninoff.
The second part of the programme will feature the Symphonie fantastique by Hector Berlioz.
The concert is being realized in cooperation with the Vojvodina Symphony Orchestra and the Music Production of the Radio Television of Serbia.
On Saturday, 18 October, one of the world's most famous violinists of the 21st century, Maxim Vengerov, a longtime favorite of the Belgrade audience and Grammy Award winner, will perform, along with pianist Polina Osetinskaya, a former child prodigy, who gave 1,000 orchestral and solo concerts by the age of eleven. This concert has already aroused great interest, and tickets for it are almost sold out.
The programme includes Sonata for Violin and Piano by Dmitri Shostakovich, Violin Sonata in G minor ‘Sonatina’, D408 by Franz Schubert, and Brahms's Violin Sonata No. 3 in D minor.
On Sunday, 19 October, the acclaimed mandolin virtuoso Avi Avital will perform with his trio, which also includes clarinetist Ismail Lumanovski and pianist Omer Klein. An artist who effortlessly combines diverse musical traditions and eras, from classical to world music, Avital takes us on a musical journey through the Mediterranean, with compositions that draw inspiration from European, Asia Minor, and North African musical traditions.
On Monday, 20 October, we will have the opportunity to hear another double bassist, in the Foyer of the Ilija M. Kolarac Endowment, Miloš Čolović, who will present his sextet and new album titled To the Beat of My Footsteps.
On 21 October, the Stanislav Binički Ministry of Defense Art Ensemble Symphony Orchestra with piano soloist Luigi Borzillo, under the baton of Dejan Savić, will hold a free concert at the Military Club of Serbia. The repertoire will include Schubert's Rosamunde, D797: Overture, Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat major, Op. 73, Emperor, as well as Mendelssohn's Hebrides, Op. 26.
On Wednesday, 22 October, we will be treated to an exceptional performance by the Third Coast Percussion (TCP) quartet at the new Ložionica venue. This quartet is also a Grammy Award winner and is celebrating its twentieth season this year.
On Thursday, 23 October, we will return to Kolarac again, with the best Serbian pianist, Aleksandar Madžar, and the programme will include a marathon of works by Maurice Ravel on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the composer's birth.
On the penultimate day of the festival, 24 October, at Ložionica, we will have the opportunity to listen to the Camerata Novi Sad ensemble for the first time at BEMUS, with violin soloist Benjamin Schmid, and the programme includes an evening of Austrian music and works by Mozart, Schubert, Berger, and Breinschmid. This programme was supported by the Austrian Cultural Forum.
The closing ceremony of this year's BEMUS, on 25 October, will feature the performance of the RTS Symphony Orchestra and Male Choir, under the direction of conductor Srboljub Dinić, accompanied by tenor Kwonsoo Jeon. The programme includes one of the most monumental symphonic works, Franz Liszt's Faust Symphony. This concert is being realized in cooperation with the RTS Music Production.
The BEMUS selector emphasized that this was the first time in 57 years that all four of Serbian symphony orchestras had participated at the festival.
Jelena Milašinović stated that out of 57 editions of BEMUS, this was the 53rd in which the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra had participated and that they were very honored to be opening the festival. She had nothing but praise for the young soloist Strahinja Mitrović, emphasizing that he was the one who carried within himself the syncretism of the present and the future. Maestro Ponti, who, according to her, carries a combination of music and film in his veins, did not choose the Italian composer Nino Rota by chance, whom the wider audience got to know precisely through film music, mostly in the films of Federico Fellini, but who also composed operas and ballets.
Aleksandra Paladin pointed out that it was a great honor for RTS production to close this year's BEMUS and that this media outlet was returning to its tradition of always presenting a great vocal work of art to the audience at the festival, and that this year it was one of the greatest works from Franz Liszt's oeuvre – Faust. Along with the RTS Symphony Orchestra and Male Choir, they have also chosen a soloist, South Korean tenor Kwonsoo Jeon, with whom they have had a long-standing artistic collaboration. According to her, by choosing this composition, RTS wanted to restore its old glory from Liszt's time, when Wagner attended the premiere performance and stated on that occasion that he had never heard anything more grandiose.
In addition to the main programme, the festival selector has also announced an accompanying programme consisting of three free masterclasses for our professionals. Maxim Vengerov will hold a masterclass at Guarnerius on 16 October, and then Benjamin Schmidt will share his valuable experience with our musicians at the same place. The third masterclass will be held by the TCP percussion quartet at Ložionica. Applications from interested parties will be submitted via our official website https://www.bemus.rs/sr/
As an accompanying programme, an exhibition of portraits of artists from this year's 57th BEMUS by photographer Aleksandar Crnogorac will open two weeks after BEMUS, also at Ložionica.
The Belgrade Festivals Centre – CEBEF is once again the executive producer of this year's edition of the Belgrade Music Festival, which is being realized with the support of the Secretariat for Culture of the City of Belgrade, the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Serbia, as well as numerous sponsors and donors, including Imlek, Hilton Belgrade, Divna voda, PI – Organization for the Collective Management of Performers' Rights, X Vitamin gallery, Public Bailiffs Chamber, Austrian Cultural Forum, Italian Cultural Centre, Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany and, of course, media sponsors – RTS and Radio Belgrade, Politika, Blic and Blic TV, Alma Quattro.
Tickets are on sale at Ticket Vision outlets and online via the website tickets.rs.