"Baltic Music Days 2023" will take place in Latvia cities Riga and Cēsis from March 18 - March 31. During the festival music from all across the Baltics will be performed in nine concerts, tickets for each concert here.
Since 2021, the three Baltic composer unions have been organizing the "Baltic Music Days" festival. Each year, the festival takes place in a different Baltic country. The first festival was held online by the Estonian Composers Union. The second festival was held in Kaunas, the 2022 European Capital of Culture.
The theme of this year's festival is "The Unbearable Lightness of Being." The festival organizers explained:
We borrowed this idea from the title of the most famous work by Czech/French writer Milan Kundera. We came up with this idea at the beginning of the war, which unfortunately is still ongoing. A war that has seeped into our daily lives, our subconscious, a war that compels us to sympathize and help as much as we can. Despite the war and sympathy, life and music continue, making us both sensitive and happy. It is both unbearably difficult and easy at the same time.
The Baltic Music Days festival will feature a variety of contemporary music by composers from Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. The festival will open at the Vidzeme Concert Hall "Cēsis" with performances by Erkki-Sven Tüür from Estonia, Žibuoklė Martinaitytė from Lithuania, and Krists Auznieks from Latvia, with conductor Guntis Kuzma leading the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra.
Other performances include a concert by Les Percussions des Strasbourg with Latvian soprano Viktorija Pakalnieci, featuring works by Gundega Šmite, Helena Tulve, Vykintas Baltakas, Thomas Hummel, and Sidney Corbett. The festival will conclude with a concert at the Jāzeps Vītols Latvian Academy of Music, featuring the Latvian Radio Choir and conductor Kaspars Putniņš, performing compositions by Ruta Paidere and others.
Watch the Ensemble Synaesthesis performance at last year's Baltic Music Days:
