Capital to host 29th music festival
ANKARA – Hürriyet Daily News
The opening concert of the Ankara Music Festival will be performed tonight by the Presidential Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Marek Pijarowski (R).
The 29th Ankara Music Festival, organized by the Sevda-Cenap and Music Foundation, begins today. The festival will feature a wide range of performances, from symphony to chamber music, from dance to vocal music, by nearly 700 artists from 14 countries, up to April 28.The festival’s venues will include the Ministry of Education Concert Hall, the Ankara State Art and Sculpture Museum, the Hacettepe University Culture Center, the Bilkent Concert Hall and Congresium Ankara International Convention and Exhibition Center.
The opening concert of the festival will be performed tonight by the Presidency Symphony Orchestra at the Ministry of Education Concert Hall, under the baton of Marek Pijarowski. Turkey’s renowned violin virtuoso Suna Kan will be the soloist of the concert, playing Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 3.
The festival will also feature the world’s one of the leading chamber music orchestras, Camerata Salzburg, with its classical music repertoire and internationally acclaimed Dutch orchestra Capella Amsterdam under the baton of Daniel Reuss.
Camerata Salzburg will be on stage with pianist Gottlieb Wallisch on April 6 and Capella Amsterdam will take the stage on April 11.
The festival is also set to give room to young Turkish talents of recent years. Pianist Salih Can Gevrek is one of those names, and he will present a Liszt night on April 9. Young violinist Eren Kuştan, who formed the Berlin Virtuosos with his musician friends in Germany, will take the stage on April 19, featuring a night of chamber music.
Other Turkish talents that will perform at the festival will be Eren Süalp with his classical guitar and one of the chamber orchestras in Ankara, Orchestra Academic Başkent.
Pianist and composer Fazıl Say, who does not often perform in Ankara, will give a piano recital on April 10.
St Petersburg Academic Symphony Orchestra will perform the closing concerts of the festival on April 27 and 28. Violinist Cihat Aşkın will be the soloist at the final concert, performing Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 35, considered to be one of the most technically difficult works for violin.
The program of the festival will not only be made up of music. Rojas y Rodriguez, who has received the Best Flamenco Dancer award in Spain, and the Rodriguez Flamenco Group will together present a show with their colorful dresses and dances.
The festival’s collaborators include German, Dutch, Spanish, Israeli, Swedish and Italian embassies, as well as various Turkish ministries and universities.
Festival tickets are available at Biletix. For further information, visit www.ankarafestival.com