The genre of string quartet is one of the most difficult to perceive and understand. Initially, it was intended not for an audience, but for performers themselves. In a quartet, there is usually neither the magnificent virtuosity inherent in compositions for a solo instrument, nor the colourfulness of a large orchestra. This is an in-depth conversation about important things, in which musical phrases are used instead of words. Shostakovich's quartets were created for concert performance, but they retained the stem property of the genre: these are heart-to-heart conversations between close friends, and some of the messages in them are encrypted. This lecture is dedicated to the art of perception of the string quartet genre and the solution of musical puzzles created by one of the greatest masters of the 20th century.

The genre of string quartet is one of the most difficult to perceive and understand. Initially, it was intended not for an audience, but for performers themselves. In a quartet, there is usually neither the magnificent virtuosity inherent in compositions for a solo instrument, nor the colourfulness of a large orchestra. This is an in-depth conversation about important things, in which musical phrases are used instead of words. Shostakovich's quartets were created for concert performance, but they retained the stem property of the genre: these are heart-to-heart conversations between close friends, and some of the messages in them are encrypted. This lecture is dedicated to the art of perception of the string quartet genre and the solution of musical puzzles created by one of the greatest masters of the 20th century.

Teodor Currentzis will give a masterclass on opera conducting. Together with young conductors and singers he will be working on opera arias.

Thanks to the famous cantata Carmina Burana, Carl Orff has a reputation of a crowd-pleaser who speaks to it in a common language. This is by no means what the hoar-headed author is like in his later stage works. Going further and further back into the depths of time, inspired by the ideas of reconstructing the archaic theatre and non-standard musical compositions, he ends up with truly radical theatrical statements – no less radical than the works of the Darmstadt School composers and their followers, who are considered to be the ‘main’ avant-gardists of the second half of the 20th century.

The orchestra in Carl Orff's De temporum fine comoedia is quite unconventional: there are no strings in its composition, except for eight double basses and a consort of violas da gamba; there are no oboes, but there are eight trumpets and six trombones. Six pianists and an organist take part in the performance, as well as 15 percussionists who play about a hundred different instruments, including congas, darbuka, timpanetto, hyōshigi and other ‘exotic’ instruments. Vocal techniques in the parts of Sibyls and Anchorites are also unusual, besides, these roles require great acting and choreographic skills. No wonder that Orff's opera is so rarely produced on world stages. Meanwhile, Teodor Currentzis addressed this score three times: in 2008 at the Territory Festival together with director Kirill Serebrennikov, in 2022 at the Diaghilev Festival with director Anna Guseva, as well as at the Salzburg Festival, where the production was staged by Romeo Castellucci. Ilya Gaisin is going to reveal musicAeterna's secrets: how the Perm production differs from the Salzburg one, why noise electronics and ready-made recordings of the orchestra and choir were added to Carl Orff's score, what special techniques were used to adapt the opera to the post-industrial space of the Shpagin Plant.