Vladimir Jurowski: During these tough pandemic times, people need beauty, music, culture

Artistic director of the George Enescu Festival Vladimir Jurowski voiced his conviction that during these tough pandemic times, people need beauty, music and culture.

People need, as such, the Enescu Festival. We need public, artists and the support of the authorities and all the sponsors. I urge you to consider the importance of this festival, particularly this year, both in terms of its illustrious history and especially in terms of the future of culture in this world, Jurowski said on Tuesday in a video message presented at the press conference announcing the 2021 Enescu Festival.

The highly acclaimed conductor informed that the programme of this edition would gather the most Enescu performances, "almost all orchestra pieces and a lot of chamber compositions."

Another topic of this edition is Igor Stravinski's music, this year marking 50 years since his death. Jurowski mentioned that he found it "essential" to include in the programme as many compositions of Stravinski, including works that had not been broadcast in Romania before, one of them going to be performed by four Romanian pianists in collaboration with drummers of the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, Russian and Romanian performers.

He said participating in the festival would be a series of extraordinary orchestras from Western, Central and Eastern Europe, and a few great British orchestras, as British music is regarded as part of the pan-European culture.

We hope that, from the cultural point of view, the dialogue with the British culture will continue and this festival will mark a new beginning in the relations between the UK and Europe, Jurowski also said.

At the same time, he mentioned the presence of contemporary music in the Festival, as well as of some worldwide performers, such as Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Sir Simon Rattle and others, and including in the programme opera music, unseen pieces so far in Romania, such as Strigoii (Ghosts) by George Enescu, being included in this year's programme.