BEMUS Festival Nears Golden Anniversary

BEMUS, the Belgrade Music Festival, is inching ever closer to its golden anniversary, celebrating its 49th edition this year. One of the most important cultural events in the city, BEMUS will take place from October 11-20. This iteration will offer the audience some real international musical treasures.

Ever since its inception back in 1969, BEMUS has always being a special event for Belgrade and Serbia. The festival, while seeking to promote local talents and ensembles, has always had a deeply international, cosmopolitan vibe, promoting some of the brightest stars of the international classical music scene. 

Over the years, BEMUS has hosted such names as Martha Argerich, Zubin Mehta, Kronos Quartet, The Royal Koncertgebouw Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, the Boris Eifman Ballet and many, many more.

This year, its constituent events will take place at various venues throughout the city, at, predictably, some of the best concert halls (the Ilija M. Kolarac Endowment, for example). However, it will also see some concerts held at atypical venues, such as the Ethnographic Museum.

The festival will open with a performance by Russia's much-celebrated Glinka Choir, led by Vladislav Chernushenko. From this famed conductor we can most likely count on major pieces of Russian and Soviet classical music, along with less well-known Russian spiritual pieces and famous works by a slew of contemporary international composers.

Another "must" of this year's edition of BEMUS is the Serbian chamber music string orchestra, St. George Strings, which is celebrating its 25-year anniversary. Josef Ziga will take to the stage as both a soloist and the artistic curator of the performance. The orchestra will perform works by Italian composers Tomaso Vitali...