Four Violin Virtuosos Will Give the Final Concert
at Viva Musica! festival

Bratislava, 12. 6. 2024

The landmark 20th annual Viva Musica! festival will present in total 13 exceptional concerts, which will be held in various places in Bratislava. Also, part of the festival will be master performance courses, given by the world-renowned violinist Maxim Vengerov and the pianist Polina Osetinskaya. In the concluding concert, visitors will be able to enjoy the virtuoso art and the interaction of violinists Dalibor Karvay, Karol Daniš and Ondrej Janoška,and their professor during their study period in Vienna and Graz, Boris Kuschnir, accompanied by Viva Musica! Orchestra.

Dalibor Karvay, Karol Daniš and Ondrej Janoška are outstanding violinists, representing the best in master violin playing among the youngest generation of Slovak musicians. All three studied violin playing in the class of Professor Boris Kuschnir, with whom they will now play together for the first time on a single stage. Boris Kuschnir today ranks as a legendary professor of violin playing, under whose guidance some of the world’s greatest masters of that instrument matured, for example Julian Rachlin, Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider, Alexandra Soumm, and the currently emerging star María Dueñas. Further testifying to his excellent influence as a teacher is the rich artistic activity and success of his Slovak graduates. All three are engaged in solo or chamber music projects, and each of them has linked his career with an important formation: Dalibor Karvay is concert master in the Wiener Symphoniker Orchestra, Karol Daniš is concert master in the Grazer Philharmoniker Orchestra / Oper Graz, and Ondrej Janoška is a member of the world-renowned grouping Janoska Ensemble. 

“I am looking forward very much to August 15, when I will meet three of my former students who are now famous violinists, and we will play this special concert together on one stage,” Prof. Kuschnir says. At Viva Musica! festival they will perform an exclusive programme consisting of works by Johann Sebastian Bach, Antonio Vivaldi, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Henryk Wieniawski and Franz Waxman for solo, two and four violins, accompanied by the Viva Musica!Orchestra. This exceptional concert will take place on August 15, 2024 at 19:00 in Slovak Radio.

Master Courses with Maxim Vengerov and Polina Osetinskaya

An exclusive novelty of the 20th annual Viva Musica! festival, which the organisers announced only a few days ago on social networks, is master courses led by the violinist Maxim Vengerov and the pianist Polina Osetinskaya. The courses will take place on the day after their joint concert: on Friday July 12, 2024 at the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava (Zochova 1). “The recital by Maxim Vengerov and Polina Osetinskaya is a red-letter day for our festival. I look forward to it all the more because their visit to Bratislava will also include master courses designed for young violinists and pianists. Participants in these courses will have a unique opportunity to gain precious experience, advice and inspiration directly from these two outstanding artists,” the festival director Janka Kovalčik says.

The master courses are designed both for active and passive participants; however, only a limited number of active participants may complete a master lesson under the guidance of these world-famed artists.  Those interested in active participation must register, using the registration form on the festival’s website www.vivamusica.sk (at latest by June 30, 2024). This event, which is organised in collaboration with the civic association Sinfonietta Bratislava and the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava, is open also to the wider public, with free admission (until the hall’s capacity is filled).

Outstanding Young Talents and an Additional Concert in Stupava

This year, the festival’s concerts will be held in new locations also. Bratislava’s Botanical Garden will provide an inimitable backdrop for a concert by the renowned Polish ensemble Equilibrium String Quartet, which will be premiered at the festival on July 13, 2024 at 17:00. The quartet specialises in historically informed performance on period instruments and rediscovery of the lesser-known chamber music of the 18th and 19th centuries. In Bratislava, among other compositions, it will present the work of the almost unknown Polish composer Józef Elsner, whose pupils included the most famous Polish composer of all, Frédéric Chopin.

Alongside the world-famed stars, Viva Musica! festival is not forgetting another equally important element of its mission, which is the constant support of young talents. One event of this kind will be a solo recital by the outstanding young pianist Pavol Bohdan Zápotočný, who will perform for the Bratislava public on August 8, 2024 at20:00 in the Moyzes Hall. Already as a pupil at the Elementary Art School in Martin, Pavol Bohdan Zápotočný won a number of all-Slovakian and international competitions. He studied at the Conservatory in Žilina and is currently a student at the Academy of Arts in Banská Bystrica. For his concert he has chosen a virtuoso programme consisting of a selection of Rachmaninov’sÉtudes-Tableaux Op. 33 and Op. 39, Liszt’s Après une lecture du Dante (After Reading Dante). Fantasia quasi Sonata and Mozart’s Sonata for Piano in F Major KV 332.

A novelty of the festival will be an additional concert outside Bratislava, specifically in Stupava. As part of the Musical Gardens cycle, on Sunday August 4, 2024 at 17:00 in the historical Manor House Park there will be a performance by the outstanding string ensemble Stories Quartet, which will appear twice at this year’s festival. The concert will be dedicated to the memory of Angelo Neumann (1838–1910), a celebrated native of Stupava, who was an opera singer and director, and afterwards a leading theatre manager in a number of theatres in Europe (Leipzig, Bremen, Prague). The concert will feature string quartets by two of the giants of 19th century music, who were Neumann’s contemporaries: Antonín Dvořák and Edvard Hagerup Grieg.

The international festival Viva Musica! was founded in 2005 and this year celebrates its 20th birthday. “Tatra Bank, together with the Tatra Bank Foundation, has long been among the enthusiastic patrons of art. Our efforts are directed towards making art accessible to the broader public, including via partnerships with the artistic community. One of these, which we highly esteem, is with Viva Musica! festival, which by now has been bringing the beauty of classical music to the capital city for 20 years,” says Michal Liday, general manager and president of the presidium of Tatra Bank and president of the Administrative Council of the Tatra Bank Foundation, general partner of the festival. 

From July 4 to August 15, 2024 Viva Musica! festival will present 13 concerts at different places in Bratislava and one additional concert in Stupava. Once again, part of the programme will be the highly-appreciated concerts in gardens and parks, subtitled Musical Gardens, and also master courses led by world-renowned artists. Viva Musica! festival is a holder of the EFFE label, the international stamp of quality conferred by the European Festival Association (EFA) on events whose common factors are a high artistic level, contribution to the development of the local scene, and an important international dimension.

Tickets are available at www.vivamusica.sk and Ticketportal. 
The Festival has been supported from public funds by the Slovak Arts Council.