The 4th edition of the International Kretinga Early Music Festival will take place on the two last weekends of August 2020. In these difficult and unusual times we are proud to announce that the Festival will present all seven originally planned concerts. We are cordially inviting you to come and discover the gem of the Festival – the oldest organ in Lithuania (1680) in Kretinga Franciscan Church – played by the most outstanding performers of early music in concerts free of charge to the public!
The opening concert on the 21st of August will be dedicated to Georg Friedrich Händel’s organ concertos, to emphasise the role of Kretinga’s organ in this Festival, and will be performed by excellent violin player Rodolfo Richter, his string ensemble and the great organ player James Johnstone. The second concert on the 22nd of August will take place in the Kretinga Cultural Center, featuring Johann Sebastian Bach’s music for violin in solo sonatas and concertos, presenting Rodolfo Richter as a soloist. The third concert on the 23rd of August will take place in Kretinga Franciscan Church and will be dedicated to French baroque music, performed by Claire Lefilliâtre, one of the most emblematic sopranos of French baroque music in our times, accompanied by the organ player Stéphane Fuget.
The second weekend of the festival will start on the 27th of August with the organ recital dedicated to the form of Toccata and performed by Andrea Buccarella, the excellent young player and the winner of the most important early music competition in Europe held in Bruges. The second concert on the 28th of August will be a tribute to Venetian baroque music of the 17th century with the program Venetia Splendor Mundi, performed by the host of the festival – Lithuanian ensemble Canto Fiorito. On the 29th of August audience will be invited to Kretinga Cultural Center to hear the recital of viola da gamba and harpsichord dedicated to Arcangelo Corelli’s music. This virtuoso program will presented by the young viola da gamba talent Teodoro Baú and Andrea Buccarella. And finally on the 30th of August the closing concert of the festival will be dedicated to Italian sacred music, performed by the ensemble Cappella Mediterranea, with the amazing soprano Mariana Flores and Leonardo García Alarcón, its conductor and organ player, who already came to Kretinga in the first edition of the Festival to improvise an outstanding organ recital.
May the music keep our spirit strong!
Rodrigo Calveyra
Artistic director of International Kretinga Early Music Festival
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