Slavia Festival 1997, illustrative notes to the programme, Bologna, Accademia Filarmonica, 24 pp.

Being at its Fourth Edition, the Slavia Festival, which was created by the initiative of the Accademia Filarmonica of Bologna with the Associazione Giovanile Musicale (A.Gi.Mus), the Il Circolo  della Musica (Endas) and under the patronage of the Italy-Russia Association, is one of the few events in Italy exclusively dedicated to Eastern European composers and music, especially in the aspects which may be less known to the wide public. The opening concert is dedicated to the Russian piano music between 19th and 20th centuries and includes, among the others, the performance of the Paraphrases upon a childish theme (written by Liszt, Borodin, Ljadov, Rimskij-Korsakov and Cui) and of some less-known piano works by Balakirev, Arenskij, Ljapunov, Glazunov and Čajkovskij. There will follow a piano and string quartet concert dedicated to the Russian and Ukrainian avant-guarde composers: Roslavec, Mosolov, Obuchov, Golyšev, Lourié, Vyšnegradskij; around 1914, these composers independently one another developed harmonic procedures of dodecaphonic type; the October Revolution isolated these original artistic experiences and prevented their spreading, not permitting them to develop into a unitary school; however, these composers have been recently revalued also after the new political and economic situation of the Ex-USSR.  After a concert which will include unpublished works for flute and piano by the Russian and naturalized-Swiss composer Pavel Fedorovič Juon (1862), there will follow a concert for viola  and piano with music by Šostakovič and Prokof’ev, famous exponents of the Russian 20th century, and by Krejn and Akimenko, less known but greatly relevant composers. As in the previous editions, the Slavia Festival will close with a Piano Marathon with three different concerts; in the first one there will be performed famous works and original paraphrases and transcriptions of works by Chopin, Čajkovskij, Blumenfel’d, Ljadov and Rachmaninov; in the second one there will be a programme dedicated to Prokof’ev, Stravinskij and Ljapunov, while the third one will be completely dedicated to the piano work by the Czech composer Leos Janaček.

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