Event: Czech Republic - Brno

Brno International Music Festival: Moravian Autumn

When:	Sep - Oct 2008 (annual)
Where:	Brno

First held in 1966, the Moravian Autumn (Moravsky Podzim) festival is one of three Brno International Music Festivals held throughout the year. The home town of composers Leos Janácek and Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Brno celebrates its musical heritage with recitals and full orchestral concerts in various venues throughout the city.

In 2003 the 38th festival opens with a ceremony at the New City Hall, with guitarist Jan Cižmár performing Leo Brouwer's Tres apuntes before the main opening concert by Brno Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Jacques Mercier at the Janácek Theatre. Weber's Invitation to the Dance (in Berlioz's handsome orchestration) is followed by Lalo's Symphonie espagnole in D minor Op 21 with violinist Alina Pogostkin and excerpts from Ravel's Daphnis et Chloé.

Over the ensuing two weeks ensembles such as the Wihan Quartet, Budapest Gypsy Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National de Pays de la Loire (with violinist Augustin Dumay and pianists Renata and Igor Ardašev), Grieg Trio, Czech Chamber Soloists, Ensemble Martinu and piano duo Florence and Isabelle Lafitte come to Brno to play. Violinist Julian Rachlin and guitarist Vladislav Bláha give solo recitals, while a colourful change of pace is marked by a Flamenco evening.

Other orchestral highlights include the St Petersburg Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Alexandr Dmitriev, in Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No 2 in C minor played by Mikhail Rudy and Shostakovitch's Symphony No 7, the mighty Leningrad. The Hungarian Radio Orchestra, under conductor Tamás Vásáry, frames Pavel Šporcl's performance of Brahms' Violin Concerto in D Op 77 and Tchaikovsky's Suite from Swan Lake with two works from its homeland, Kodály's Dances from Galanta and Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody, Pest Carnival.

The Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra of Olomouc, conducted by Milan Kaòák, accompany soprano Lada Biriucov and tenor Miroslav Dvorský in an opera gala, while the festival ends with the Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Georg Schmöhe in a resplendent programme starting with Stravinsky's colourful ballet score Petrushka, continuing with Chopin's Second Piano Concerto in F minor Op 21, with Jan Simon, and ending with local boy Janácek's Sinfonietta.