FESTIVAL of FIRSTS

(Left–right) Guido Rimonda. Ramin Bahrami and Massimo Mercelli will be performing together

Artist-in-residence Sergej Krylov performs in a solo recital at the 2018 festival

From 28 September to 12 October 2019 the Auditorium Giovanni Arvedi at the Museo del Violino will welcome some of the most acclaimed violinists from around the world for their debut performances at STRADIVARIfestival. This is, perhaps, to be expected from an event named after the greatest violin maker the world has ever seen, and founded essentially to promote the instrument that symbolises Cremona. But this year the festival will also involve four renowned pianists, albeit, naturally, in concerts that also feature a significant number of stringed instruments. The seventh STRADIVARIfestival sees big names playing some of the best-loved concertos in the repertoire and directing and performing Classical and Romantic symphonic and chamber pieces. Violinists including Giuliano Carmignola, Daniel Hope and Guido Rimonda will play on extraordinary masterpieces of classical Cremonese violin making, each with their own fascinating voice and story. Rimonda’s ‘Leclair’ Stradivari of 1721 (also known as ‘Le noir’), for example, was once owned by Jean-Marie Leclair, the French violinist and composer who was murdered in 1764. The pianists, including Krystian Zimerman, Alexander Lonquich, Ramin Bahrami and Uri Caine, showcase a range of different styles and characteristics, with Caine taking on the highly original project of transcribing symphonic scores by Wagner for a café concert-style ensemble.

The festival also marks the first appearance by a Cremonese cellist, Giovanni Gnocchi, who arrives at a golden moment in a career that has already seen him play as a soloist with some of the best orchestras in the world and earn a teaching post at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. And speaking of Mozart, there will be a concert dedicated entirely to the composer, starring the festival’s artist-in-residence, Sergej Krylov. This performance, held in November as a kind of appendix to the festival, will celebrate 250 years since Mozart’s first trip to Italy, which included a visit to Cremona. Then on 18 December, as tradition now dictates, the STRADIVARImemorialday will return to mark the anniversary of the death of the great violin maker. This year it will be celebrated by an ensemble that, for the first time, and exclusively to the event, will see the front desks of the three most renowned orchestras in Italy – Scala, RAI and Santa Cecilia – performing together.

For more information, visitwww.stradivarifestival.it