Gidon Kremer / Kremerata Baltica - Hymns & Prayers - New ECM Album & Tour Dates

New York, NY (Top40 Charts/ ECM Records) - The Hungarian composer and pianist Stevan Kovacs Tickmayer from the Serbian province of Vojvodina has written eight hymns in commemoration of the film director Andrei Tarkovsky, an artist he has called a homo moralis whose remarkable visions cast a small but significant light on the tragic world of the previous century.

The Georgian composer Giya Kancheli has written a silent prayer for two dear friends: the cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich and the violinist Gidon Kremer. The meditative emotionality of the hymns and the ascetic tranquility of the prayer are offset by C�sar Franck?s Piano Quintet in F minor like a premonition of Beethoven?s Appassionata, whose second movement, marked Lento, molto sentimento, in turn takes up the mood of the other two works. This combination does more than provide a superficial contrast: it is beholden to an intrinsic principle of the sort that the painter Paul Klee developed in his theory of harmony in the visual arts: any compositional harmony will gain character through dissonances, with the balance being restored by counterweights.

North American Tour Dates 2010:
10.29. Seattle,WA - Benaroya Hall
10.31. Berkeley,CA - Zellerbach Hall
11.01. Costa Mesa,CA - OCPAC Segerstrom Hall
11.02. Denver, CO - Newman Center
11.04. Montreal, PQ - Place Des Arts
11.05. Toronto, Ont - Royal Conservatory
11.06. Chicago, IL - Harris Theater
11.08. Chapel Hill, NC - Memorial Auditorium
11.09. Winston Salem, NC - Wait Chapel
11.11. New York, NY - Alice Tully Hall / White Light Festival
11.12. Boston, MA - Jordan Hall