The opening program of the Two Palaces - Music
On the opening day, Wednesday, April 20, at 9:30 pm, Alejuandro Buendija i Sinovi, a project by Saša Antić from the renowned Croatian hip-hop group TBF, whose album won the two most prestigiuos Croatian music awards (Porin and Rock & Off) in the category of best hip-hop music album, will perform at Petar Zoranić Square. Expect superb lyrics, lots of black humor, a range from rap through pop and chanson to rock. They are accompanied by Banana zvuk, a Split duo made up of musicians, producers, DJs and MCs Luka (of TBF as well) and Yuri (ST! Llness). They are engaged in researching and promoting rhythms from reggae, hip-hop, dancehall, jungle to various mashups.
On Thursday, April 21, at 8 pm, the audience will be able to hear the first concert in the new, Versatile Hall in the Providur Palace. The Croatian Radiotelevision Jazz Orchestra, led by Miron Hauser, is performing music of the featuring soloist - Victor Goines, American saxophonist, clarinetist and composer, member of the famous Wynton Marsalis Septet. The list of musicians Goines has collaborated with is impressive: among them are Ray Charles, Bob Dylan, Dizzy Gillespie, Lenny Kravitz, Diana Ross and Stevie Wonder!
Friday, April 22 is also about jazz: after an excellent concert last year, Elvis Stanić Group, one of the best Croatian contemporary guitarists and accordionists and the most awarded Croatian jazz composer of the middle generation, returns to Zadar, this time with a completely new program. It is a concert promotion of the new album Insomnia, which represents a departure from the previous sound and a step into new genre areas of jazz music. The concert is scheduled for 8 pm in the Versatile Hall.
The Zadar Chamber Orchestra was founded in 1961 by Pavle Dešpalj. Today, the orchestra has grown into one of the best in the region, where great musicians not only from Croatia but also from other parts of Europe come to play with great zeal and pleasure. In memory of its recently deceased founder, the Orchestra will perform a selection of his works, with the premiere of Ante Knešaurek's composition and Dmitry Shostakovich's Chamber Symphony. The orchestra is conducted by Pavle Zajcev, an expert on Dešpalj's music (who, among other things, premiered Dešpalj's Concerto for Cello and Strings), and Nikola Fabijanić performs as a soloist on alto saxophone. The concert is scheduled for Monday, April 25 at the Versatile Hall. In cooperation with the Zadar National Museum and the Zadar Concert Office, the photo exhibition Dešpalj Family through the lens of Ante Brkan will be set up in the same hall.
A day later, on April 26, one of the most prominent performers of early Baroque music in the world, tenor Marco Beasley, who after graduating from early music at the University of Bologna in 1984 founded the ensemble Accordone with which he achieved world fame. At a concert at the Exhibition Hall, he will present the Due Radici (Two Roots) program, which explores his mother's Italian roots and his father's English roots - from Monteverdi to Pino Daniele, from Dowland to Nick Drake, from Naples to the green fields of Coventry. He will be accompanied on architlute and baroque guitar by his long-time collaborator Stefano Rocco, who gave the first concert of his international career in Zadar in 1984, at the 24th Musical Evenings at St Donatus with the Italian ensemble I Laudesi, performed a program of Italian and English early music.
The program ends on Friday, April 29, when the Austrian accordionist and bandoneonist Klaus Paier and the Croatian cellist with a long-standing Viennese address perform at the Bersa Brothers Concert Hall. Asja Valčić, a native of Zagreb with family roots from Zadar, as an extremely talented cellist at the age of only 18, completed her studies at the Music Academy in Zagreb. The road took her further to Moscow to the prestigious Tchaikovsky Conservatory. As a duo, they have been collaborating for more than a decade. With their original programs and performances, they delight both the audience and the critics - with their "amazing combination" (as The Guardian noted) simply, as Der Spiegel added, "they take your breath away". They are a kind of pioneers in the genre of crossover of classical music and other styles. Tango and world music, jazz and classical, composition and improvisation - all these are areas where their music lives.
Admission to the events is free. It is mandatory to pick up tickets free of charge at the info desk of the Providur's Palace from Thursday, April 21 at 10 AM.