International Music Festival Imago Slovenia

Contact

Mednarodni glasbeni festival Imago Sloveniae

Gornji trg 16, SI-1000 Ljubljana

http://www.imagosloveniae.net

imago@siol.net

Phone386 (0) 1 241 6600

Organised byImago Sloveniae

Frequencyannual

Festival dates13.6.2015 - 24.8.2015

Though the International Music Festival Imago Slovenia was formally established in 1994 by the Imago Sloveniae, its founding can be also dated to 1986. In that year, the Summer in Ljubljana Old Town festival was first set up by the Society for the Revitalisation of the Cultural Image of the Old City Centre as a series of open air concerts aiming to enliven and revitalise the old city centre of Ljubljana.

This 'festival' is still active today, though it is now subsumed within the framework of the International Music Festival Imago Slovenia, which has up until now encompassed about two dozen cities and towns around Slovenia (Bled, Dobrna, Kranjska gora, Maribor, Metlika, Nova Gorica, Piran, Ribnica, Škofja Loka, Velenje, Vipava, etc) and also abroad (Gorizia and Trieste in Italy, Bleiberg in Austria and Trieste, Szentgotthárd in Hungary; all of these places have a significant Slovenian population).

Between the end of June and the end of September, about 50 events take place. Clasicall and early music, the focus of Summer in Ljubljana Old Town, have been joined by jazz and ethno, but also blues and rock. In producing musical projects, the festival cooperates with many other institutions like Slovene National Theatre Opera and Ballet Ljubljana, the Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra, the RTV Slovenia Big Band.

Aims of the festival

The events organised in the individual towns in coproduction with local producers take place at local heritage sites, thus helping to develop living, contemporary artistic expressions in the already culturally curious settings.

The most important goals of the project are the expansion of diverse artistic forms into smaller towns, the promotion of classical music, artists and performers and accessibility to cultural goods. That is also why the concerts have free admission.

Programme

The main bulk of the programme of the festival consists of classical music from different periods for various chamber groups, choirs or symphony orchestras. The festival has cooperated with literally thousands of artists both from Slovenia and abroad, so the Prokofjev Guitar Duo, Ljubljana Vocal Academy, Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra, the Accord Quartet (HU), the Harvard Din & Tonics (US), the Egyptian Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra (EG), the Wolverhampton Youth Orchestra and the Wolverhampton Youth Wind Orchestra (UK), Coro Filarmonico Trentino (IT), the CREA Symphony Orchestra (DK), the City of Belfast Youth Orchestra (UK) and Trio Smetana (CZ) present a very limited overview.

Jazz and ethno now also play an important feature in the programme, which has hosted Katalena, Barcelona Gipsy Klezmer Orchestra (ES), Jean Toussaint Four (US), Yasuto Ohara Super Jazz Trio (JP). The jazz programme is since 2009 run as a special category of the festival, called The Jazz Stage.

Four concerts from each season are recorded by Radio-Television Slovenia (RTV Slovenia) and five by Radio Slovenia.

Barcelona Gipsy Klezmer Orchestra LIVE at IMAGO festival, Ljubljana 2013 by Robindro Musica on YouTube

See also

• Imago Sloveniae
• Nights in Ljubljana Old Town

External links

• Imago Sloveniae website