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Avanti! XXXI Suvisoitto – Just be / Wed-Sun 29.6.-3.7.2016, Porvoo and Loviisa

This year, the artistic design of Avant’s Suvisoito is the responsibility of Suvisoito concertmaster and conductor Dima Slobodeniouk. The five-day music event features 14 concerts and events that invite you to relax and be surprised in summer in Porvoo. New free city concerts will bring Suvisoito right to the heart of Porvoo.

 

Moscow-born Finnish conductor Dima Slobodeniouk is a very familiar partner for Avant and this is his eighth Summer Overture. For this year’s Suvisoitto, Slobodeniouk has chosen to bring music that acts as a counterbalance to the constant hustle and bustle.

 

“Nowadays we are in a hurry and things have to happen immediately. Fortunately, art and creativity do not fit this mould (fashion), and that is why art is necessary. We all need space to think, feel, act and just be. This year’s Summerfest programme is a kind of unspoken message: an invitation to come and be present and enjoy the space and the moment in music,” Slobodeniouk says, describing the Just be programme.

 

Dima Slobodeniouk is currently Artistic Director of the Galician Symphony Orchestra and in autumn 2016 he will also become Principal Conductor of the Lahti Symphony Orchestra and Artistic Director of the Lahti International Sibelius Festival.

 

Free concerts lower the threshold to participate in Suvisoitto

 

The opening concert on 30 June will feature the German Jörg Widmann as both clarinet soloist and composer.

“Jörg Widmann is a phenomenal clarinettist and a brilliant composer whose works are commissioned and premiered by almost all the top orchestras and soloists in Europe and beyond. We are delighted to have him as clarinettist and composer for the opening,” said Slobodeniouk. Widmann’s music will also be heard at the closing concert of the Summer Festival on 3 July. The opening concert will also feature the glass harmonica, popular in the 17th century, which is making a comeback, and its contemporary verrophone.

 

Chloë Hanslip, the young violinist who delighted the Lahti Symphony Orchestra and Dima Slobodeniouk in March, will play the European premiere of Michael Hersch’s Violin Concerto on Saturday 2 July and the closing concert on 3 July, as soloist in Ludwig van Beethoven’s Violin Concerto. Other soloists include Christa Schönfeldinger, glass harmonica, and Gerald Schönfeldinger, verrophone, of the Vienna Glass Armonica Duo, Avanti! Päivi Severeide, harp, and Mika Väyrynen, accordion, and Ismo Eskelinen, who will be the soloist in Sebastian Fagerlund’s Transit Guitar Concerto, premiered earlier on Friday 1 July. The Madrid-based flamenco group Camerata Flamenco Project will also perform at the same concert. In addition to Dima Slobodeniouk, the conductors of the Suvisoito will be Olari Elts and Andres Kaljuste.

Martti Suosalo, Seela Sella and Vuokko Hovatta, among others, will take to the stage of the Culture House Grand when the characters of the popular play The Nightingales perform Anna-Mari Kähärä’s hilarious compositions in a children’s concert on Saturday 2 July. The Grand will also once again host a composition workshop for young composers. The club concert on Saturday evening 2 July at the Zum Beispiel restaurant will bring together Camerata Flamenco Project and Anette Åkerlund, a singer representing the Finnish Roma singing tradition.

Suvisoitto is expanding further into the heart of Porvoo with a new four-concert series. “We want to bring Suvisoito to all Porvoo residents. The city concerts are small-scale and accessible events, but with guaranteed Avanti! quality musical content. The festival is being developed under the theme” Porvoo’s own orchestra “, and the low-threshold day concerts will provide an opportunity to deepen the relationship with the audience while respecting the concert tradition,” says Maati Rehor, Avant’s Executive Director, who is preparing her first Suvisoitto. Admission is free to the city concerts and to the Friday night Night Play at the Arts Centre on 1 July.

The festival buses will take concert-goers from Helsinki to the concerts in Taidetehta and back.

 

See the full programme: https://avantimusic.fi/suvisoiton-ohjelma/

 

 

Chamber Orchestra Avanti!

 

Chamber Orchestra Avanti! was founded in 1983 by conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, flutist Olli Pohjola and conductor Jukka-Pekka Saraste. The orchestra’s aim is to provide the highest quality of music-making between enthusiastic and skilled musicians. Avant’s open-minded and flexible composition has made it possible to hear repertoire in Finland that would otherwise go unheard. The orchestra’s artistic director is clarinetist Kari Kriikku.

 

Avanti! offers music for the open-minded and takes its listeners on bold choices: the familiar seems fresh and new, the new soon familiar. Avanti! moves freely through different eras and genres, with a variety of line-ups and an uncompromising commitment to quality.

 

Avanti! Summer music

 

The annual summer festival Avanti! Summer Play was founded in 1986. The Summer Play is a cross-section of Avanti’s activities: new music of the Avanti! generation is in some ways the main focus, but the musical timeline ranges from baroque to premieres. The city of Porvoo has also long associated the arrival of musicians with its cultural heritage. Artistic directors of the Summer Festival have included violinist Pekka Kuusisto, conductor Hannu Lintu and composer Kaija Saariaho.

 

The main sponsors of the festival are the City of Porvoo, Neste and Aktiasäätiö Porvoo.

 

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EVENT INFORMATION

Avanti! XXXI Summer Play

Wed-Sun 29.6.-3.7.2016, Porvoo

The venues are Pernaja Church, Porvoo Art Factory, Culture House Grand (Porvoo), Restaurant Zum Beispiel (Porvoo) and Porvoo Gymnasium. Updated information at www.avantimusic.fi.

 

TICKETS ON SALE FROM 31.3.2016

– Tickets for concerts €10-35 (including service charge). Reduced prices for children (0-16 years), students, pensioners, conscripts, conscripts and unemployed persons.
– Festival Pass 160/125 € (incl. service fee) includes tickets to all paid concerts.

– More information on tickets: https://avantimusic.fi/liput/

– Tickets in advance at Lippupiste, www.lippu.fi or call 0600 900 900 (€1.98/min + pvm, open daily 7-22). 2.7. tickets for the club concert can be bought in advance at the restaurant Zum Beispiel.

 

FESTIVAL BUSES

– Festival buses run from Helsinki to Taidetehta and back.

– For more information and timetables: https://avantimusic.fi/festaribussi/

Choreographer Petri Kekon’s latest work “Stop – the dark substance of art” sheds light on the hidden dark side of artistry with five dancers and five musicians. This powerful union of music and movement will premiere at the Lumee Media Centre on 13 May 2016. The work will also premiere a composition by Jovanka Trbojevic, interpreted by Avant’s Wind Quintet.

Studio Stage, Media Centre Lume, Helsinki, Finland

Fri 13.5.2016 at 19
Sat 14.5.2016 at 19
Tue 17.5.2016 at 19
Thu 19.5.2016 at 19
Fri 20.5.2016 at 19
Sat 21.5.2016 at 19

Petri Kekoni Company
Avanti!
Petri Kekoni, choreography, concept and production
Jovanka Trbojevic, composition

Dancers:
Meeri Altmets, Tanja Illukka, Pekka Louhio, Saku Koistinen and Eero Vesterinen

Musicians:
Helmi Malmgren (cl), Angel Molinos (bcl), Harri Joy (bsn), Erkki Suomalainen (cbsn), Alexis Routley (horn)

Understanding requires a pause. Rhythm requires a break. Often it is the pause that makes the movement visible and allows us to gather the information we have previously seen in our minds. Few, however, are able to give the pause the value it deserves.

“What happens when nothing moves, no ideas are born, the artist has stopped? You can’t show this state to the outside world – the artist must always be an energetic, creative and inspiring person. Yet art requires pauses in order to evolve, just as dynamic movement requires pauses in order to create continuity. When does a movement end and when does the next one begin? The space between these events – the waiting space – is what we hunt for. The pause seeks to turn the pause, this ‘dark matter’ of art, into light.”

“When does the movement end and the next one begin? It is the space between these events – the waiting space – that we are hunting for. It is claimed that space is held together by a so-called dark matter, the composition of which we do not know. Could the various degrees of physical and mental stasis be the force that holds art together – its ‘dark matter’” – choreographer Petri Kekoni

 

Tickets 25/15€ – buy tickets here!

www.kekonico.fi