New festival to launch in Georgian wine country

Gianandrea Noseda, Martin T:son Engstroem and Avi Shoshani have teamed up to create Tsinandali Festival, a new 15-day festival that will take place in Georgia. Running from 8-22 September, the festival will feature stars of the classical music scene as well as its own youth orchestra.

Hosted on the Tsinandali Estate in East Georgia, known as a home for wine making, the festival includes performances from soloists Yuja Wang, Lisa Batiashvili, Mischa Maisky, Renaud Capuçon and András Schiff. It also boasts conductors JukkaPekka Saraste, Lahav Shani and Omer Meir Wellber.

The festival’s own Pan Caucasian Youth Orchestra will feature 80 young musicians from the region, led by music director Noseda. The new orchestra will open the festival on 8 September with a performance of Mahler’s second symphony.

“I’m particularly inspired by the creation of the Pan Caucasian Youth Orchestra,” commented Noseda. “This really convinced me that the Tsinandali Festival will be something special as through music we can try to develop a new society based on friendship and respect despite any differences in politics or religion because music has a unique language.”

Two new venues have been built on the estate – a 1,200 seat amphitheatre with a retractable roof and a chamber concert hall with a capacity of 600. Architect Xavier Fabre, known for his work on the acoustics for Philharmonie de Paris, led the project.

Tsinandali Festival is funded by investment fund Silk Road Group whose chairman, George Ramishvili, hails from Georgia.