The Vienna Philharmonic, Camerata Bern and Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Camerata Salzburg and Janine Jansen, the Bayerisches Staatsorchester led by Vladimir Jurowski, Orchestra Dell' Accademia Nazionale Di Santa Cecilia and Cameron Carpenter are among the ensembles and soloists performing at Enescu Festival this week. More on the program and where to watch the events below.

Enescu Festival's third week brings concert versions of opera works, several of them as a premiere in the country. On September 11, conductor Lawrence Foster will lead the Hungarian Opera of Cluj for a program that includes Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande. On September 12, the George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Hannu Lintu, and the George Enescu Philharmonic Choir, conducted by Iosif Ion Prunner, will deliver a concert version performance of Britten's Billy Budd. On Sunday, September 17, the George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir, this time led by Arnaud Arbet, will present Ligeti's Le Grand Macabre, in a French version translated by Michel Vittoz and Arnaud Arbet.

The festival's series - Great Orchestras of the World, Atheaneum Concerts, Midnight Concerts, Enescu and His Contemporaries, and Romanian Orchestras - will bring to the stages of Bucharest violinists Patricia Kopatchinskaja and Janine Jansen, while conductor Vladimir Jurowski, the festival's previous artistic director, returns alongside the Bayerisches Staatsorchester for two performances: one features pianist Yefim Bronfman, for a program that includes the prelude to Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, Schumann's Piano Concerto in A minor, and Mahler's Symphony No. 4, the other, violinist Vilde Frang for a program covering Poleva's White Interment, Berg's Violin Concerto, and R. Strauss's Eine Alpensinfonie. During the weekend, the American organist and composer is back in Bucharest for a performance of several works by Bach and his own Improvisations.

The full program is listed here.

Associated events

After a break for several years, the Festival Square, a program of free, outdoor concerts, returns at this edition between September 17 and September 24 in the George Enescu Square, while VR installations, exhibitions, film screenings, and musical residencies add to the events associated with the festival.

The Bucharest public can see, throughout the duration of the festival, Wolfgang, a performance-type installation filmed in VR by choreographer Gigi Căciuleanu. Actors Lelia Marcu-Vladu, Lari Giorgescu, Ana Iacob, and Bogdan Iacob were part of the project, bringing to life "characters that evolve in a timeless Mozartian space." The installation can be seen at Sala Palatului.

The Enescu Museum has prepared three events for the festival. At Sala Palatului, the photo-documentary exhibition George Enescu in France, displaying documents from the George Enescu National Museum archive, is open throughout the festival. A second exhibition organized by the museum showcases Enescu's activity as composer, violinist, conductor and pianist between 1923 and 1950. Titled George Enescu on the American continent, it can be visited until September 24th at the National University of Music in Bucharest. As part of the same partnership with the university, the concert Enescu and today's composers, delivered by the ensemble Devotiomoderna led by Carmen Cârneci, is scheduled for September 15 at the National University of Music in Bucharest.

Concerts associated with the festival also take place across the country, in Arad, Botoșani, Brașov, Constanța, Craiova, Cluj-Napoca, Pitești, Ploiești, Râmnicu Vâlcea, Satu Mare, and Sinaia. More on the associated events here.

At Rezidența9 in Bucharest, the public can see the Music Gallery, open until October 1st. It is a sensory exhibition where visitors can enjoy music's playful side. Developed by the team behind the festival Jazz in the Park, the project started with jazz music but includes sections dedicated to classical music and Enescu in particular. Visitors can find here a disc library and numerous playlists to listen to, musical instruments and games, and more.

Two open-air concerts are scheduled for September 17th and September 20th near the Romanian Athenaeum. The audience will be able to see the Dinu Lipatti Orchestra of the Satu Mare Philharmonic, conducted by Azis Sadikovic, and a BRD-powered event taking the public on a musical journey from the Renaissance to contemporary electronic beats.

Meanwhile, Piano Express aims to bring classical music into everyday spaces with the help of pianist Adriana Toacsen and her guests. Every outdoor concert in the series is meant as "a gesture of love towards the city and music." The concerts in the series are listed here.

Where to watch: 

Tickets are still available for some of the concerts in the program, mostly those not held at the Atheneum. Those who cannot make it to the festival have the option of watching some of them on the festival's website, where they are streamed live and remain available for a total of 12 hours. The available concerts can be seen in the festival website's live stream section or on their individual pages, to be found from the main program page.

The public television TVR broadcasts more than 60 concerts from the festival, either live or recorded. The live broadcasts include the series of concerts for children. The events can be watched on TVR Cultural, TVR 1, TVR International, and TVR Moldova. Most concerts are available on TVR Cultural. Likewise, the public radio stations Radio Romania Muzical and Radio Romania Cultural broadcast a number of concerts from the program.

(Photo: Andrada Pavel, courtesy of Enescu Festival)

simona@romania-insider.com