Lithuania and the World. To mark the 45th anniversary of Kaunas String Quartet

Performers:
KAUNAS STRING QUARTET
GUODA GEDVILAITĖ (piano)
MINDAUGAS ZIMKUS (tenor)

Programme:
JULIUS JUZELIŪNAS – String quartet No. 1
CÉSAR FRANCK – Piano quintet in F minor, Op. 14
GIEDRIUS KUPREVIČIUS – Cycle for string quartet and tenor Vienadienės Tėvynės dainos (The Overnight Homeland Songs, lyrics by Jonas Kossu-Aleksandravičius, Justinas Marcinkevičius, Vincas Mykolaitis-Putinas, Gintaras Patackas and Lithuanian folk)
KASPARAS ŠERPYTIS – Miniature for string quartet (premiere)

The Kaunas String Quartet, celebrating its 45th anniversary, is one of the most established and prominent chamber music ensembles in Lithuania. With this concert, the Quartet aims not only to mark its anniversary but also, by fostering the traditions of chamber music, to promote the promulgation of national music, as well as to bring together music from different eras and styles into a cohesive artistic programme through active collaboration with Lithuanian performers. 

The concert will feature Julius Juzeliūnas’ String quartet No. 1, one of the composer’s most significant chamber music opuses, revealing his original musical language and means of expression. The music of J. Juzeliūnas, whose 110th birthday we are commemorating this year, made a significant contribution to the formation of the Lithuanian compositional school of the 20th–21st centuries, the development of a modern musical language, and the strengthening of national identity.

Giedrius Kuprevičius’s Vienadienės Tėvynės dainos (The Overnight Homeland Songs) will enrich the programme with a contemporary reflection on national identity and cultural memory. The text of the work is based on the poems of Jonas Kossu-Aleksandravičius, Justinas Marcinkevičius, Vincas Mykolaitis-Putinas, and Gintaras Patackas, as well as the Lithuanian folk poetic tradition and the semantics and symbolism of the Lithuanian alphabet. The concert will also feature a premiere: composer Kasparas Šerpytis is working on a miniature with Lithuanian flavour. Alongside works by Lithuanian composers, the programme will feature a masterpiece of late Romanticism: César Franck’s String quintet in F minor, considered one of the composer’s most mature chamber music works.

This concert is a significant cultural event that brings together the Quartet’s extensive experience, the heritage of Lithuanian music, and the tradition of European classical music, thereby strengthening the cultural identity of Kaunas and all of Lithuania.