Andrejs Osokins will be giving a variety of concerts in Riga, Ventspils, Daugavpils and elsewhere in Latvia this summer and autumn. These will include solo concerts, the programme “Three Osokins” with his father Sergejs and brother Georgijs Osokins at Dzintari Concert Hall in Jurmala, the poetic concert “Dreams about the Piano” with Chulpan Hamatova in Daugavpils and others.
On 30 September at 19.00, the Blackheads’ House will host a solo concert by Andrejs Osokins, dedicated to the composer Frederic Chopin, which has so far been performed in various halls in Latvia and Estonia, but not in Riga. The programme includes favourite miniatures by Chopin – waltzes, mazurkas and etudes, as well as large-form works – ballades and polonaises. Andrejs Osokins will play the concert programme on a new Yamaha CFX concert grand piano brought from Germany, which will be heard for the first time in Latvia and perfectly intoned and tuned for this concert by Shunsuke Yokoyama from Japan. Andrejs Osokins has a special connection with this instrument, as he was one of the world-renowned pianists involved in its creation. Each of them had the opportunity to play prototypes of the instrument at Yamaha’s offices in Vienna and Hamburg, to evaluate their sound and to suggest improvements for further development.
Andrejs Osokins says: “This concert will be very special for me, both because I will be playing my Chopin concerto at the Blackheads’ House, where the atmosphere is very luxurious but at the same time intimate, which I have loved during the last two Osokins Freedom Festivals, and because I will be performing it on the new Yamaxa CFX grand piano, which I can always rely on. The colourful and romantically varied sound of this instrument, which aptly matches Chopin’s genius music, allows for a very emotionally saturated program. It will be the music that Chopin wrote in exile, where he found himself after the Tsarist Russia attacked Warsaw, and it expresses his deep love for his motherland, which I think connects perfectly with our times, when countless Ukrainians have had to flee their country as refugees because of Russian aggression.”
At the very beginning of autumn, on 16 September at 16.00, Andrejs Osokins will return, after a long break, to the Ventspils Concert Hall “Latvija” with a concert programme dedicated to the composer Ferenc Liszt – his work, personality and life. During the concert, the pianist will also play Liszt’s music on the unique vertical piano of the Concert Hall “Latvija”.
On 21 July, Andrejs Osokins’s virtuoso piano playing will be heard at the Jurmala Festival in the Dzintari Concert Hall, where this year’s only Osokin dynasty concert “Three Osokins” will take place, with Andrejs performing together with his father Sergejs and brother Georgijs Osokins. On 24 August, the concert programme “Dreams of the Piano” with actress Chulpan Hamatova will take place at the Unity House in Daugavpils, and on 14 October, the pianist will give a solo concert “Osokins to Liszt” at the Madona Culture House.
Tickets for the concerts are available at the “Biļešu Paradīze” box office and online at www.bilesuparadize.lv.