Orta, music against drought

Music is an especially winter art, especially for those who struggle with it by playing it, sweating on percussion, handling keyboards and string and wind instruments; when summer reaches its maximum temperatures, the music on the lakes, now threatened by drought, appears to mitigate its ardors: regions that are among the most beautiful in Italy, united in a symphony that unites Orta, Stresa, Como. On 1 July in the Basilica of the Island of San Giulio the XXII edition of Orta Festival kicks off with the homonymous orchestra directed by Amedeo Monetti, inventive and directive soul of the event: the opening immediately attracts the eye and the ear to an unusual title, the “Nocturne” for violin, harp and strings by Arnold Schoenberg, a score for sextet that anticipates the “Transfigured Night” a few years later; then Mahler’s Adagietto della Quinta, an intimate diary of the “end of the century”, and two early symphonies by Haydn and Mozart. The Serbian pianist Aleksandar Madzar, a constant friend of the Orta Festival, returns on 8 July to the Church of Santa Maria Assunta, with a program that sees him first as a soloist in two Beethoven Sonatas, and then in duo with Hans Liviabella (Sonata by Debussy for violin and piano) and then in trio with the addition of Matteo Pigato’s cello for Brahms’ Trio op.8. The following evening is the turn of the “Leonardo” Quartet, with two masterpieces by Haydn and Mozart and a significant modern opening to Webern and Rihm. Interest remains high with the duo of cellist Marie Ythier and pianist Raffaella Damaschi and with the recital by pianist Giuseppe Andeloro (Bach-Busoni’s Chaconne is also on the program); to close, on July 17, we return to the Basilica of the Island of San Giulio for the “Zaïde” Quartet, also scheduled for a transcription of Beethoven’s “Sonata a Kreutzer”.