Traditionally, at the most poetic time of the year – at the intersection of spring and summer – one of the oldest and largest Ukrainian festivals – the 43rd International Festival of Music Art “Virtuosos” invites Lviv residents and guests to enjoy musical compositions and hear musicians from all over the world! The festival is organized by the Myroslav Skoryk Lviv National Philharmonic.

In 2024, the festival will last 17 days, from May 16 to June 2.

Seventeen events of Virtuosos will symbolically unite the past and present and once again remind the world of the unwavering faith of Ukrainians in our artistic renaissance, as well as in the power of music to heal hearts.

Virtuosos 43. PRELUDE OF FESTIVAL
Thursday 16.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes music by Leoš Janacek, Marek Kopelent, Bohuslav Martinů and Antonín Dvořák

What does it mean to live in a historical time and remain artists of your country? This is a question history suggests not only to our generation. A century ago, beauty creators also understood the importance of choice.

Prague, Paris, journeys in America, and the landscapes of Czech towns are hidden in their hearts, as well as the desire to create new music, to give life to folk songs known since childhood, and thus overcome the bans on their country’s art rising. This is the contact between the creative paths of composers Leoš Janáček, Antonín Dvořák, Bohuslav Martinů and Marek Kopelent. It will be presented at the pre-festival event by world-class virtuoso musicians of Ukrainian origin: Oksana Hretchyn, violin; Theodore Kuchar, viola; Nataliia Hutsul, piano; and one of the best cellists of our time, Jiri Barta.

Virtuosos 43. Opening Concert. BLOOMING FERN
Friday 17.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes music by Yevhen Stankovych, Edward Elgar, and Bohuslav Martinů

“Music is a matter of human creation, it is a part of human existence,” – with these words of the outstanding Ukrainian composer, our contemporary Yevhen Stankovych, one of the largest European classical music festivals begins. The grand opening will be performed by one of the leading orchestras of the Philharmonic – the Academic Symphony Orchestra of the Lviv National Philharmonic under the trampoline of Theodore Kukhar. The concert will begin with a unique symphonic suite from the folk opera “When the Fern Blossoms” by the outstanding contemporary Yevhen Stankovych.

The orchestra will be joined by the famous Czech cellist Jiri Barta. His solo will be performed in Edvard Elgar’s Cello Concerto in B minor. The opening will conclude with the quintessence of musical talent of one of the most famous Czech composers, Bohuslav Martinů – Symphony No. 4.

Virtuosos 43. ANTICIPATION
Saturday 18.05.2024 / 18:00

The program includes music by Gustav Mahler, Yevhen Orkin, and Oleksandr Rodin

Mahler’s original and large-scale Fourth Symphony, Oleksandr Rodin’s iconic and mystical composition “Holy God” and the premiere of Yevhen Orkin’s symphony commissioned by INSO-Lviv – in exciting anticipation, we are waiting to meet you in the hall of the Lviv National Philharmonic at the concert, which is also called “Premonition”.

Each sound and chord of this evening will become an attempt to reveal and convey the unique moments before the great and desired. Powerful symphonic sound will take the audience to a world of vivid images, where time slows down and the music becomes a language of expectation, hope, and dreams.

Virtuosos 43. DREAMSCAPES. NEW SEASONS
Sunday 19.05.2024 / 18:00

The program includes music by Edward Elgar, Michalis Travlos, Erwin Schulhoff, Antonio Vivaldi – Max Richter

Surprisingly, listeners of different generations are able to hear even well-known works in different ways. It’s not the first time the Philharmonic has performed the music of Greek composer Michalis Travlos, but this time the premiere is unexpected! Michalis Travlos has collected his own allusions to his time in Poland in his “Concertante”.

The work of the Czech composer of the last century, Erwin Schulhoff, is also associated with the rethinking of the achievements of previous centuries. For our contemporary, London-based composer Max Richter, The Four Seasons became one of the first musical impressions that began to fade over the years, so in 2012 the composer decided to take a bold and ambitious step – to enter into a dialogue with Vivaldi himself, to record his own reinterpretation. We invite you to get new impressions of the classics crystallized over the years performed by the tandem of Lviv Virtuosos under the trampoline of Volodymyr Syvokhip and the soloists of the concert.

Virtuosos 43. ACADEMY’S INVITATION
Wednesday 22.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes music by Christoph Gluck, Giuseppe Torelli, Julius Klengel, Gioacchino Rossini, Kurt Atterberg, Myroslav Skoryk, Yevhen Stankovych, Yurii Reshetar, and Viktor Telychko

The Virtuosos Festival has remained a challenge for the student musicians of the Lviv Academy Chamber Orchestra for over forty years, and the most impressive programs are chosen to remind them that an eternally young ensemble is also eternally high. The best orchestra players are given an unforgettable chance to perform a solo. This tradition has been going on since the first years of the festival and continues to encourage young musicians to new achievements.

Under the watchful eye of the Academy’s director and concertmaster, Arthur Mykytka, and artistic director and conductor Ihor Pylatiuk, more than one generation of famous musicians has already formed, so we advise you to take a closer look at the young soloists, and maybe next time you will hear about them as world-class virtuosos!

Virtuosos 43. FOR SHEVCHENKO
Thursday 23.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes music by Sydir Vorobkevych, Denys Sichynskyi, Stanislav Liudkevych, Yakiv Stepovyi, Valentyn Silvestrov, and Bohdana Frolyak.

It’s amazing how one artist managed to awaken the hearts of millions of descendants – Shevchenko’s Kobzar was one of the books that Mykhailo Starytskyi and Mykola Lysenko secretly read in their youth. It was the sense of freedom he gained in his youth that inspired the composer to create uniquely Ukrainian music for many years and to capture Shevchenko’s legendary masterpiece in music.

For half a century, Lysenko worked on Music to Kobzar, choosing a path identical to Shevchenko’s combination of folk art and academicism that resulted in 82 pieces organized into seven series. Even the most ardent admirers of Shevchenko and Lysenko would not be able to fit such a volume of music into one program, so the soloists-baritone Stanislav Badrak, cellist Yaroslav Myhal, and pianist Myroslav Drahan limited themselves to selected compositions after Shevchenko’s texts.

Virtuosos 43. MUSIC DIALOGUES
Friday 24.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes music by Borys Liatoshynskyi, Karol Szymanowski, and Pierre Wissmer.

Strong international ties have always been a part of Ukrainian music history and the Virtuosos Festival in particular. That is why on May 24, the Lviv Philharmonic will host a concert of Ukrainian, Polish, and Franco-Swiss composers conducted by Vincent Kozlowski, a renowned Polish conductor. The soloist is Andriy Pavlov, and the Academic Symphony Orchestra of the Lviv National Philharmonic will perform.

In the early 1920s, the most prominent Ukrainian symphonist of the century, Borys Liatoshynskyi was shaped as a vivid modernist. At that time, the young Karol Szymanowski from Tymoshivka (now a village near Kropyvnytskyi) traveled to Warsaw to study. Pierre Wissmer, a future post-Romantic artist, was taking his first steps in music. Over the next few decades, they would compose large-scale works of the highest quality, of symphonic power, full of devotion to the depths of their peoples’ folklore.

Virtuosos 43. CASSANDRA’S BRAND
Saturday 25.05.2024 / 17:00

The program includes music by Karol Szymanowski, Simon Laks, Borys Liatoshynskyi, and Oleksandr Kozarenko

Pulsars, visionaries, and creators of the artistic continuum around us – this is how we can characterize the composers whose works are included in the program of the Phoenix String Quartet. Their destinies were not directly intertwined, but, engraved on the tablets of history, they are somehow connected in the world consciousness.

They will sound: The First Quartet by Karol Szymanowski, a Pole whose family roots stretched all the way back to Tymoshivka in what is now Cherkasy Region; String Quartet No. 4 by Simon Laks, a Jew who led the Auschwitz prisoner orchestra; a pro-European reinterpretation of Ukrainian folk themes written at the height of World War II in the Fourth String Quartet by Borys Liatoshynskyi; and the authentic sound depths of Inventions by Oleksandr Kozarenko, a Ukrainian Ruthenian.

Virtuosos 43. WITH US – VIVALDI
Saturday 25.05.2024 / 20:00

The program includes works by Antonio Vivaldi

On May 25, the newly created early music ensemble Terra Barocca will share the discoveries of antiquity. It will make its debut on stage under the direction of artistic director Anna Ivanyushenko.

This time, Antonio Vivaldi’s music will be performed on the stage! An inventive master of sound and a fascinating innovator of his time, he created unique compositions that go beyond the canons and reveal the most original features of each of the instruments involved.

Instrumental duets and trios, vocal arias from Vivaldi’s operas, and a chamber concerto – most of these works were composed by the artist at the zenith of his career, in the 1720s. During this concert, the Baroque interpreters invite the audience to witness how a new trend of the Lviv school of historically informed performance is being formed on the Philharmonic stage.

Virtuosos 43. UKRAINIAN NOSTALGIA
Sunday 26.05.2024 / 18:00

The program includes works by Mieczyslaw Karłowicz, Felix Mendelssohn, Alla Sirenko, and Yurii Shevchenko.

The evening’s warm atmosphere, woven from orchestral works that somehow belong to the late romantic tradition, is dedicated to a sense of nostalgia. The songfulness of Mieczyslaw Karłowicz’s Serenade and Felix Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in D minor, a work of the young genius, will be performed by the famous soloist Myroslava Kotorovych under the baton of Viktoria Zhadko.

The evening will continue with “Mass for Ukraine” by Alla Sirenko, a contemporary Ukrainian artist who went down in history as the first Ukrainian composer to premiere a fantasy opera at the Royal Opera House in London, and “Batiar Songs” by Yurii Shevchenko. You won’t have to borrow music lovers’ admiration for them, because such a unique program happens “only in Lviv” and only with the participation of the most virtuoso musicians.

Virtuosos 43. RHAPSODY. CONCERT. SYMPHONY
Tuesday 28.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes music by Heorhii Maiboroda, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Franz Schubert

A Ukrainian and two Austrians once got together… to present an extraordinary idea at the Virtuoso Festival. So – obviously – no one will remain indifferent. The symphony evening will take the audience from the rhapsody genre (where the individual is above all) through an instrumental concert (where musicians are in search of a balance between soloist and orchestra) to a symphony (where the collective element prevails). Works by Heorhii Maiboroda, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Franz Schubert will be performed, not by chance gathered in one program.

At the easel of this magnificent panorama is the Lviv National Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra conducted by Aidar Torybaiev, with pianist Oksana Rapita as soloist.

Virtuosos 43. YOUNG CELLO VIRTUOSOS
Wednesday 29.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes music by David Popper, Max Bruch, Antonio Vivaldi, Joseph Haydn, and Josef Mysliveček

Over the course of the Virtuosos Festival’s more than forty-year history, many generations of professional musicians have grown up. For many of them, their first performances as soloists at the festival were the beginning of a bright career. After all, not everyone has the opportunity to take to the stage of the Philharmonic during one of the oldest and largest music festivals in the country while still a student.

However, the organizers know that true virtuosity does not come with years or the number of concerts played but is determined by talent, perseverance, and ambition. Therefore, over the years, the festival has developed a good tradition of allowing young virtuosos to prove themselves. This year’s participants are cello virtuosos Anastasia Zokhniuk, Mariia Khodakivska, and Olha Kulchytska, who are taught by professor, artist, and mentor of a plethora of contemporary cellists Yurii Laniuk.

Virtuosos 43. FIRST AIR RAID ALARM
Thursday 30.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes works by Morten Jessen and Taras Zdaniuk

Dedicated to Ukraine, the young Danish composer Morten Jessen’s work Kyiv, with Ukrainian violinist Nataliia Hordieieva as the soloist, has been a great success in more than twenty cities in Denmark. OUR Recordings, a music label associated with Naxos, has recorded a studio recording of the duet version (scheduled for release in spring 2024). The composer is sincerely convinced that the project will not be fully realized until Kyiv is performed in Ukraine. So this time, the musicians will perform the planned dedication to Ukraine during the Virtuosos Festival.

In addition, they will perform pieces inspired by the composer’s many years of work as a church organist. The title of the program is a symbolic composition by Taras Zdaniuk “7.12. First Air Alert”. The young author dedicated it to all Ukrainians who died in the first hours of the full-scale invasion. Nataliia Hordieieva regularly performs this music during her tours in Europe, as she is convinced that not only Ukrainians should hear the sounds of the air raid and understand their meaning.

Virtuosos 43. SUNRAY
Friday 31.05.2024 / 19:00

The program includes works by Samuel Barber, Thomas de Hartmann, Charles Ives, Eduard Rezach, and Myroslav Skoryk.

There is probably no route that would take you halfway around the world in an hour, from the lands of the Ramapo tribe to the heights of the Carpathians, invite you to an evening promenade in New York, and then, after passing through a number of European capitals, end up in New Jersey to bring the melodies of the Ukrainian Sumy region. Only art can do this.

The journey will be represented by the guests of the festival – the National Odesa Philharmonic Orchestra, which will visit the festival on the last day of spring.

Virtuosos 43. FROM THE HEART
Saturday 01.06.2024 / 16:00
Potocki Palace

The program includes works by Hee Cheol Kim, Zoltan Almashi, Georg Friedrich Handel, Oswaldo Golikhov, Jules Massenet, Hanna Havrylets, Myroslav Skoryk, Giacomo Puccini and Yangmin Choi.

No matter how far away from home people’s destinies may lie, their native landscapes continue to live on in memories, dreams, and dreams. Thus, even the most intense memory of one’s home can become a refuge in difficult moments. This is what the new joint program of the French singer Sérine de Labaume, the string quartet Serenade Ensemble and double bassist Yarema Kitsyla is about.

Céline visited Lviv for the first time in the summer of 2022, having given a series of concerts in support of Ukraine in European cities, she came with the most life-affirming works to give moments of admiration and relaxation. This time, Serina’s voice will be enveloped by the soft timbres of strings.

“Music from the Heart” is dedicated to everyone who has ever felt longing for once happy places. The pieces included in the program are a kaleidoscope of countries, centuries, and styles: from a melancholic song based on poetry by the Horye dynasty to the baroque flurry of emotions of Cleopatra’s Aria, as embodied by Georg Friedrich Handel.

Virtuosos 43. DREAM
Saturday 01.06.2024 / 18:00

The program includes works by Derek B. Scott, Nino Rota, and Jan Sibelius

It is intense and unpredictable, sometimes thorny and dramatic, with ups and downs, with the risk of despair, and the desire to give up, but often with moments of great exaltation and inspiration. In the opinion of the INSO-Lviv Symphony Orchestra, this is the path to a dream.

The orchestra’s program is no less intense, with musicians already known to the Lviv audience – double bassist Krzysztof Firlus and conductor Paul Mann – performing together. Listen to the premiere of Derek Scott’s heartfelt “Pavane”, dedicated to the victims of the war in Ukraine, the virtuoso Concerto Divertimento for double bass and orchestra by the famous film composer Nino Roth, and the grandiose patriotic Symphony No. 2 by Jan Sibelius. This is the music that makes wings grow behind your back and returns faith in goodness to your heart.

Virtuosos 43. Closing Concert. SYMPHONY. LOVE
Sunday 02.06.2024 / 18:00

The program includes works by Bohdana Frolyak and Viktor Kosenko

To celebrate the continued presence of love today, the festival will conclude with the premiere of the Third Symphony by the famous composer Bohdana Frolyak.

Symphony No. 3 “Love” was commissioned by the director of the Lviv National Philharmonic, conductor Volodymyr Syvokhip. It was he who suggested to the composer that she should use Vasyl Barvinskyi’s piano cycle “Love” as a certain idea for the work: “And although Barvinskyi’s cycle is directly related to feelings for a woman, in my Symphony I interpret the concept of love more broadly – as love for a neighbor, love for the Earth on which you live, for the World, for the Creator, and, ultimately, for a loved one. This is music that contains tragedy, light, drama, and hope – in short, everything that we experience in this difficult time.

Viktor Kosenko, a sincere lyricist by heart, was the same way. A phenomenal pianist, he created a masterpiece designed for big stages and deep respect. Ukrainian pianist Violina Petrychenko will be the soloist of the performance.