Following a highly successful tour together in 2013, Kirill Karabits returns to conduct the I, CULTURE Orchestra on their fourth tour in August. The tour includes the ensemble’s debut at the Edinburgh International Festival on 17 August where the orchestra performs a programme of Panufnik and Shostakovich.

The first concert of the tour is on 10 August at Kultursommer Nordhessen in Kassel where the orchestra performs The Two Pictures from Kara Karayev’s The Seven Beauties, Shostakovich’s Symphony No.7 and Liszt’s Piano Concerto No.1 with soloist Alice Sara Ott. Alice returns to perform the concerto again with the orchestra on 12 August at the Roque d’Anthéron in a programme which also includes repertoire from Dvořák and Khachaturian. The final concert of the tour is on 23 August in Stockholm as part of the Baltic Sea Festival.

The I, CULTURE Orchestra is an outstanding ensemble comprised of some of the most talented young musicians from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, Poland and Ukraine. The orchestra was formed in 2011 by the Adam Mickiewicz Institute as part of the cultural programme of the Polish Presidency of the EU. The ICO’s twin aims are to form a great orchestra of international young musicians and to create an outstanding and innovative vehicle for positive cultural and social co-operation and international development. Following an audition process, the young players gather together each summer in Poland for a period of workshops and rehearsals before embarking on an international tour.

The orchestra undertook its inaugural tour in 2011 under Sir Neville Marriner and Pavel Kotla, performing to great acclaim in some of Europe’s leading concert halls including the Berliner Philharmonie, London’s Royal Festival Hall and the Teatro Real in Madrid. 2012 featured a return to the orchestra’s cultural homeland, with concerts across Eastern Europe in a tour conducted by young Venezuelan Ilyich Rivas. The 2013 tour saw concerts in Sweden, Denmark, Iceland and Estonia, with soloists Truls Mørk and Khatia Buniatishvili.