Shropshire's Piano Week international festival and summer school will stream concerts
International music festival and summer school Piano Week has turned to live streaming due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Plans for its Beethoven chamber music festival at The Holroyd Community Theatre near Oswestry have been postponed until next summer.
But the festival will be online at the end of the month with a series of eleven solo piano recitals given by the in-house concert pianists and streamed live from locations including USA, South Korea and Austria.
Festival Director Maciej Raginia said: “All of the concerts are part of the Piano Week Online Edition (pianoweek.com/online), a brand new digital version of the summer school which has attracted participants from the USA, Canada, Columbia, UK, Norway, Cyprus, Dubai and Hong Kong.”
The Holroyd Community Theatre and Moreton Hall School, which would normallyhost the summer school will be broadcasting live throughout the week via the theare's website, Moreton Hall's Youtube and Facebook pages.
The festival will be opened by The Romanian pianist Madalina Rusu on Saturday at 7.30pm with a Romantic programme featuring works by Chopin, Clara Schumann, Brahms and Rachmaninof.
There will be performances during daily lunchtime and evening performances until July 30 featuring works by Bach, Beethoven, Debussy and Scaratti.
Moreton Hall music director and Founder of North Shropshire Music Helen Rayner said: “Annually we would welcome performers far and wide to join us in The Holroyd Community Theatre for this very special event where all concerts would ordinarily take place.
“Current restrictions imposed by COVID-19 however enable us to reach out to an online audience with an infectious programme and we are fortunate to continue to be part of this exciting week of solo piano recitals, which will be broadcast live from The Holroyd.”
