Chamber music festival Avanti

Chamber music festival ‘Avanti’ is having the eighth festival this year. ‘Avanti’ invited professional chamber orchestras in Lithuania to attend the festival this year. This type of event is the first one in Kaunas and Lithuania. The festival will become known as ‘chamber orchestras festival’ in spring 2019. This ambitious aim will allow the audience to listen to various chamber orchestras from all over Lithuania. The program is already exclusive! Various regions will be presenting the composers their area is famous for. For example, Klaipėda chamber orchestra will perform Eduardas Balsys pieces – as it is going to be 100 years since the composer was born; The Vilnius City Municipality St. Christopher chamber orchestra will present the music of the great composers who were born in the capital city; Kaunas Vytautas Magnus university chamber orchestra will perform music of famous composers who lived in Kaunas (commemorating 150 years since Juozas Naujalis was born and to celebrate 75th jubilee for composer Giedrius Kuprevičius).

As the festival is always looking for different chamber compositions and music variety (In 2018 modern music composer Fabian Muller from Switzerland presented concert for cello, grant piano for 4 hands and chamber orchestra; In 2017 a polish composer Mikolaj Majkusiak performed ‘Rhythm games’ for accordion, percussion and chamber orchestra; Liutautas Janušaitis presented a double album ‘Two different sides’ (saxophonist L. Janušaitis was accompanied by Chamber Orchestra and jazz performers); First time in Kaunas the audience had a chance to listen to Arvydas Malcis music ,,Vox clamantis in deserto”; In 2016 composer from Brazil Andre Mehmari presented a concert ‘Strambotti’ for clarinet, accordion and chamber orchestra). This year we will have a pleasure to present you the Baltic quartet for Guitars (Chris Ruebens ‘Paprasto žmogaus istorijos’) and national choir ‘Vilnius’ (J. MacMillan’s ,,Seven Last Words from the Cross”).

Vytautas Magnus university chamber orchestra and festival ‘Avanti’ are inseparable. Chamber orchestra performs the newest pieces of chamber music by realising its ideas and staying open to further musical experiments. The aim for 2019 is to invite all chamber orchestras in order to hold an exclusive music festival this year. This, by all means, motivates the performers’ professional abilities and helps to exceed the ordinary and reach for extraordinary by providing the listeners with the newest musical discoveries in our country. Every year we have quests from all over the world who kindly bring a piece of their culture and music to share with us here in Kaunas. Performers form USA, Italy, South Korea, Switzerland, Canada, Romania, Austria, Great Britain, Estonia, Latvia, Poland already entertained Lithuanian audience during our previous ‘Avanti’ festivals. This year we are having quests from China and Belgium. Hope the audience enjoys the festival as much as we all do which will help the music thrive and flourish in the future.