Although the regular concert season is paused for the summer, classical music concerts are not as various projects keep the show going outdoors or in lesser-visited venues. We outline below some of the events and festivals scheduled for this summer.

Starting this weekend, Athenaeum Summer Festival will bring a mix of classical and jazz in six concerts that will see the George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra perform alongside pianist Lise De La Salle for the opening concert and ending the event with Carmina Burana, alongside the Choir of the George Enescu Philharmonic. David Crescenzi will conduct the last performance, where the soloists are the soprano Veronica Anușca, tenor Valentin Racoveanu, and baritone Mihai Damian. Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and Wynton Marsalis will also perform at the festival.

On Saturday, June 24th, the Athenaeum String Quintet and violinist Rafael Butaru will take the stage for an outdoor concert in front of the Athenaeum. The program includes works by Ciprian Porumbescu, George Enescu, and Antonio Vivaldi. Entrance is free of charge.

More on the concerts in the program here.

Also in Bucharest, the Magic Summer festival covers eight weekly symphonic and chamber music concerts scheduled between July 5th and August 23rd. The event, which takes place at the Romanian Athenaeum, is meant to offer a going-out alternative to those spending summer in the city.

The program includes a concert with 100 cellos for the festival's opening; a piano recital by Sînziana Mircea in a format that also includes organ and flute performances; an evening dedicated to double bass; and a performance from the George Enescu Chamber Music Orchestra alongside violinist Alexandru Tomescu.

Among the soloists the public will be able to see are Davide Mariano, Mariia Velia, Radu Chișu, Andreas Ehelebe, Felix Leissner, Pavlos Semsis, Stanislau Anishchanka, Constantin Sandu, Gabriel Croitoru, Simina Croitoru, Oxana Corjos, Cristian Niculescu, and Alexander Sitkovestki, while the orchestras performing are the Royal Camerata Orchestra, the National Symphonic Orchestra, the Romanian Youth Orchestra, the Romanian Sinfonietta Orchestra, and the George Enescu Chamber Music Orchestra, conducted by Cristian Mandeal, Constantin Grigore, Alexander Sitkovestki and Cristopher Petrie.

More on the program here.

The second part of the SoNoRo Conac tour has just kicked off and will cover five additional concerts in the SoNoRo Conac - Fiddler on the Roof edition.

Two of the venues that host concerts are newly restored, namely the Cloister of the Franciscan Monastery in Gherla and the Teleki Castle in Posmuș. Other locations are the residence of painter Gheorghe Fikl in Socolari, an area called "the village of Timisoara artists," the Painters' Colony in Baia Mare, a place representative of the Baia Mare school of painting, founded in 1896, and the Palace of Justice in Arad.

As with every edition so far, the event aims to associate music with various architectural landmarks to highlight the need to preserve and rehabilitate the local heritage but also to bring back chamber music to its original space.

The program is available here.

Musica Barcensis, the series of concerts held at fortified churches, kicks off in Brașov county on June 25th. The church in Bartolomeu will host the opening concert, delivered by the Bach Choir of the Black Church in Brașov.

Other concerts will be held at the churches in Cristian (July 2nd), Bod (July 9th), Vulcan (July 16th), Ghimbav (July 23rd), Prejmer (July 30th), Hălchiu (August 6th), Cetatea Feldioara (August 13th), Hărman (August 20th) and St Martin Church in Brașov (August 27th).

Ensembles of musicians coming from Switzerland, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, the US, Israel, Austria, and Germany will be present at the festival for the first time this year, Steffen Schlandt, the conductor of the Bach Choir, explained.

The event is meant to offer musicians in Brașov the opportunity to connect to the local heritage while marking the 90th anniversary of the Bach Choir. Furthermore, the festival will allow the public the chance to visit the St Martin Church in Brașov, a lesser-known landmark of the city, which will host a harpsichord and violin recital.

This year's edition of the festival is set to end on September 3rd, with a concert at the church in Codlea.

Entrance to the events is free of charge, and various public transport lines are available to reach the venues included in the festival. The program is available here.

In Sibiu, the 13th edition of the festival Classics for Pleasure is set to take place between July 19th and July 23rd. This year's edition will open with Sounds of Reverence, the St Ursuline Roman Catholic Church concert, where a brass quintet will perform adapted choir pieces.

Classics for Fun, an event for children, invites young audiences to discover the work and life of Mozart in an interactive performance, while the concert Scenery in Music is meant as a celebration of Sibiu's landscapes.

The festival's final concerts are Everybody's Music, highlighting classical music as a unifying force for civil society, and the Proms of Delight evening, covering a series of crossover pieces.

Entrance to the events is free of charge. The program is available here.

Elsewhere, Rooftop Concerts return to Sibiu between July 30th and August 12th with 14 events that deliver a program of classical music, canto, jazz, rock or electronic music. As the event's name suggests, the concerts take place on the rooftop of the Sibiu Philharmonic building. The program includes performances from the National Youth Orchestra of the Netherlands, the Swiss Youth Symphony Orchestra, the Musica Viva and Icon Arts ensembles, and more.

Further details are available here.

In Cluj, the seventh edition of Opera Aperta is on until June 25th, with a program that brings together classical music concerts and technology. The festival opens with the concert Innamorato di te, which will see baritone Florin Estefan and tenor Eusebiu Huţan perform alongside the Romanian Opera in Cluj Napoca Orchestra and Italian bandoneonist Giancarlo Palena.

A highlight of the program is the Cluj Opera's staging of Rigoletto, conducted by David Crescenzi. Tenor Ovidiu Purcel as the Duke, Simone Piazzola as Rigoletto, and soprano Andreea Mădălina Barbu as Gilda are part of the performance offered free of charge on June 25th in the city's Unirii Square.

The Hungarian Opera of Cluj and Gheorghe Dima Music Academy have performances included in the program, which also covers the exhibition Interweave - Mapping Visual Polyphonies, open in the city's Ştefan cel Mare Park.

Access to the events is free of charge. The program is available here.

(Photo: Alika1712 | Dreamstime.com)

simona@romania-insider.com