Yefim Bronfman, Andras Schiff among Tsinandali Festival headliners
Set to run with regulations for pandemic safety, the festival will look to keep the high bar it set in its launch two years ago in terms of attracting renowned names of classical music. Photo via Tsinandali Festival.
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Internationally recognised pianists Yefim Bronfman and Andras Schiff will be among headliners of this year's Tsinandali Festival, with the celebration of classical music set to head to a chateau of historical nobility in Georgia's east next month.
They will be part of a line-up bringing artists of global renown to the 2019-launched festival, organisers of which continue to keep the ambitious event going this year with regulations to safeguard against the Covid-19 pandemic.
Bronfman, a six-time Grammy Award-nominated musician who earned the prize in 1997 for a recording of Bartok Piano Concerti with Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, will open the event alongside conductor and pianist Lahav Shani in renditions of Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3 and Daphnis and Chloe Suite No. 2 by Maurice Ravel.
Shani, a young artist who took over as music director of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra last year from Zubin Mehta, has been praised as a conductor "taking the musical world by storm" by WRTI.
On day two, Schiff, a Grammy-winning pianist and conductor, will lead performances of works by Bach, Mozart and Beethoven at the estate. The appearance of the artist who has received the Gramophone Award and Royal Academy of Music Bach Prize, among other honours, will further mark the high bar of the Georgian festival.
The two performers will represent only a fraction of the entire roster booked by the organisers for the third festival edition, with the likes of Mao Fujita, Amanda Forsyth and Georgia's own Lisa Batiashvili among over a dozen other names slated to take to the stage throughout the 11 days of the event.
Among these, Batiashvili, a recipient of two ECHO Klassik awards and the MIDEM Classical Award, will feature on two separate occasions.
She will lead a concert involving young classical talent from Georgia - namely pianists Sandro Nebieridze, Tsotne Zedginidze and Giorgi Gigashvili, as well as mezzo-soprano Natalia Kutateladze - on the penultimate day, before returning for the closing show alongside conductor Gianandrea Noseda, the music director of the festival.
Started with an aim of contributing to regional promotion of classical music in Georgia, as well as an opportunity for young performers from the South Caucasus and a wider neighbourhood, the festival was featured by the BBC Music Magazine in its launch year as a "must-visit" occasion.
The 2021 edition is set to run at the amphitheatre of the Tsinandali Estate between September 8-19.
While various Georgian festivals and competitions have been postponed in recent weeks, classical music enthusiasts can look forward to the second edition of the Tsinandali Festival in the country's sunlit eastern province of Kakheti later this year, with major artists like Martha Argerich and Lisa Batiashvili in the roster.
Internationally renowned musical artists and a youth orchestra bringing together performers from across the Caucasus will make the maiden edition of the Tsinandali Festival in Georgia’s east an occasion to celebrate later this year.
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Georgia's internationally recognised violinist Lisa Batiashvili has addressed an open letter to Salome Zurabishvili, the country's president, asking her to help facilitate admission of the imprisoned former president Mikheil Saakashvili at a private health clinic, instead of the prison hospital the latter is currently held at.
Established names of international scene, from pianists Lucas Debargue and Mao Fujita to Ukrainian conductor Oksana Lyniv and others, will be on stage of this year's Tsinandali Festival in a historical estate in Georgia's east, with the event also set to showcase some of the brightest young domestic talent.