CONCERT SERIES: THE GREATEST CONCERTS ARE AT THE FESTIVAL D'AIX
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From 30 June to 18 July 2020, the Festival d’Aix presents a series of sixteen unique symphony and chamber music concerts celebrating the genius of Beethoven and the rich oeuvre of composer Kaija Saariaho, featuring some of the biggest names of the 2020 edition, and highlighting the diversity of Mediterranean music.
CYCLE BEETHOVEN & CYCLE KAIJA SAARIAHO
Casals Quartet, Balthasar Neumann Ensemble conducted by Raphaël Pichon and by Thomas Hengelbrock, and the Trio Sōra will pay homage to Beethoven. Marie-Laure Garnier & Célia Oneto Bensaid, London Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Susanna Mälkki, and Kari Kriikku along with Avanti! Quartet will highlight the composer Kaija Saariaho.
BIG NAMES OF THE 2020 EDITION IN CONCERT
The Festival’s operas bring together some of the most sought-after artists in the world. A number of them take advantage of their presence to offer standalone concerts. Such is the case with Sir Simon Rattle and the London Symphony Orchestra, who will be making their big comeback to the Festival d’Aix with a symphony concert. The barytone Christian Gerharher, in the title role of Wozzeck, who is also an uncontested master of lied, offers a recital with pieces by Berg, Schubert and Fauré. The French soprano Sabine Devieilhe, who plays the Queen of Shemakha in Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Golden Cockerel, will be singing a programme devoted to Mozart and Strauss. The countertenor Jakub Józef Orliński, revealed to the entire world when he performed at the Festival in 2017, returns to Aix with a recital of Baroque opera songs and Polish melodies.
Hearing barytone Christian Gerhaher is always an experience in which the artist’s sensitivity and intelligence strike the listener’s heart and mind with full force.
LA CROIX
THREE MEDITERRANEAN CONCERTS
The Festival d’Aix will be also welcoming for the first time the vocal ensemble Tenores di Bitti “Mialinu Pira,” with a concert of Sardinian polyphonic singing. The new symphony session of the Mediterranean Youth Orchestra, uniting roughly 80 instrumentalists, will be performing pieces by Spanish composer Francisco Coll, Dutilleux and Moussorgski during the final concert of their residency, conducted by Duncan Ward, their new musical director. The Medinea intercultural session will be bringing together a dozen improvisational musicians from different backgrounds, in collaboration with the Belgian saxophonist Fabrizio Cassol, for an evening of collective creation.
