A REAL SUMMER TREAT

A WORD MORE: Concert Roman & Friends: Musical Compounds at KotorArt

KotorArt, following the development of today’s big festivals and contemporary strategies in the promotion of art, for several years has been cooperating successfully with Luštica Bay, which this year also helped to realize one of the programs of Don Branko’s Music Days. The concert titled Roman &Friends: Musical Compounds was held on Saturday, July 28th, while the audience in Kotor will hear the extended version of this program on Monday, July 30th, at the Church of the Holy Spirit. At the beginning of the concert, the guests were addressed by Executive Director of the Luštica Development Company Darren Gibson, and by Director of the KotorArt Don Branko’s Music Days Ratimir Martinović, who were satisfied with their mutual cooperation.

In keeping with the tried-and-tested concept at home, which is also cherished at other festivals, the performance of Roman Simović, as host of the evening, gathered his closest associates. One of the best violinists of our region, the concert-master of the London Symphony Orchestra, Simović performed with musicians who also played at KotorArt last year, with violist Milena Simović, cellist Giovanni Gnocchi and cellist Dragan Đorđević, while he presented for the first time in Montenegro violinist Cecilia Ziano and violist Robert Smissen. Cecilia Ziano has been the first violin of the Lyskamm String Quartet and a Principal Second Violin of the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. As for the violas, Milena Simović is a member of the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra and also performs with the London Symphony Orchestra, while Robert Smissen has been the leader of the Viola section in the renowned Academy of St. Martin in the Fields Orchestra (ASMF). Giovanni Gnocchi, who has gathered his experience in performing in the Camerata Salzburg, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra of London, the Münchner Philharmoniker, the London Symphony Orchestra, is Professor at the Mozarteum University in Salzburg, while Dragan Đorđević, a member of the Rubikon String Quartet and the Double Sens Ensemble, is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Music in Belgrade and Artistic Director of the School for Musically Gifted Children in Ćuprija.

For the program, artists selected one of the best string sextets in the history of music, one of the famous chamber works by Piotr Ilitch Tchaïkovski. Namely, the composer called the Sextet in D minor, Op. 70 Souvenir de Florence, because part of the composition was created during his stay in that Italian city. On the contrary, in the last two movements, out of four, there are clear reflections of the Russian folklore. This piece, however, with its romantic spirit was a good choice, if viewed from the position of its purpose, i.e. the audience. And when it comes to the compounds, they were not only a reflection of the joint performance of professionals. It was an amalgam of the past, embodied in romantic melodies and the landscapes of Tuscany, and the present, mirrored in the Mediterranean spirit that was being created at that moment in the Luštica Bay settlement. And a real summer treat for the end – the popular Love Tango by Astor Piazzolla in an interesting arrangement for string sextet.