About

The International Joseph Achron Music Festival honours the memory of this legendary Litvak composer, born in Lazdijai, every year. This time, the festival will open with a special concert at the Lithuanian National Philharmonic Concert Hall, where the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra will be conducted by the celebrated Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, and the concert programme will feature works by two prominent composers of Jewish descent, Joseph Achron and Mieczysław Weinberg, as well as a new piece for violin, cello, and symphony orchestra titled Needle of Light by New York-based composer Žibuoklė Martinaitytė. 

Belshazzar, the ruler of Babylon, who in the Middle Ages was associated with the idea of the Antichrist, eventually became a symbol of conceit, blasphemy, and inevitable doom. Achron presented his own interpretation to the public in 1924 while living in Berlin; it was first performed in Israel that same year as part of a production staged at the “Teatron Eretz Israeli”. Many details surrounding the production remain unclear, but it is known that later, while living in the United States, Achron reworked the music for the production into an independent concert piece for symphony orchestra. 

The festival’s opening concert will be symbolically capped off by Symphony No. 21 by the Polish-born composer Weinberg. Its title, Kaddish, refers to a hymn from Jewish religious rituals. This work embodies not only the legacy of Jewish music, but also Gražinytė-Tyla’s deeply personal mission to introduce Weinberg’s music to as wide an audience as possible by conducting his works in recordings and concerts. 

Organizer – PI “Ars Lituanica”, partner – the Lithuanian National Philharmonic Society