The success of the first edition of the Ascona Music Festival (which was dedicated to the bicentennial celebration of the birth of Fryderyk Chopin and Robert Schumann) and the warm response of the public endorse this second edition which consists of 9 concerts. The artistic director of the Festival is Daniel Levy, the world-renowned Argentine pianist who is considered to be one of the best interpreters of the classical/romantic repertoire.

Ascona is located next to the majestic Lake Maggiore and is surrounded by the impressive Swiss Alps. Its natural beauty is an ideal setting, providing a suitable atmosphere for a festival that aims to attract all lovers of chamber music performed at the highest artistic level. The festival has been created with the awareness of the profound effects that classical music has on the heart of human beings and nature.

This year the theme of the programme is the piano as a solo voice and in a musical dialogue with the strings, with the most sublime works within the chamber repertoire in Duo, Trio, Quartet and Quintet. The select group of musicians involved in this edition of the festival guarantee unforgettable musical experiences for the listener, due to their musical sensibility and vast experience within international music and concert centres.



The festival will begin with a Beethoven Cycle that will explore some of the composer's masterpieces; all performed over five exceptional evenings. The first two concerts (9 and 16 July) are dedicated to Trios for piano, violin and cello performed by the pianist Daniel Levy, the Israeli violinist Yehezkel Yerushalmi and the Italian-Polish cellist Franco Maggio Ormezowski.

The next three concerts of the cycle will take place on 23 July, 30 July and 6 August and will include the 10 Sonatas for violin and piano performed by the American violinist Robert Zimansky and the pianist Daniel Levy.

On Friday 5 August there will be a concert by the renowned musician Luis Paniagua, member of a famous Spanish family of musicians and luthiers. He will play the Ancient Orpheic Lyre, an instrument that was lost to the world for centuries before being recreated by Marsilio Ficino in the Renaissance It is the evocative, therapeutic and magical music of Orpheus in the hands of a musician committed to a deep and interior message that leads us to ancient Greece, through the delicate and intense sound of this instrument.

On Saturday 13 August the outstanding Harmonia Piano Quartet will perform. The members of the quartet are the pianist Daniel Levy, the violinist Robert Zimansky, the Romanian violist Alin Velian and the cellist Franco Maggio Ormezowski. They will perform works by Mozart, Mahler and Brahms.

On Saturday 20 August Daniel Levy will perform an open-air Piano Recital in the square of the charming Ronco sopra Ascona. The evocative beauty of the surroundings, overlooking Lake Maggiore and Brissago Islands, is an ideal setting to listen to music by the great composers Beethoven, Schumann and Liszt. The entrance is free.

On Saturday 27 August an unmissable concert will take place with the Swiss Carmina Quartet, one of the most internationally celebrated quartets. Its members are the violinists Matthias Enderle and Susanne Frank, the violist Wendy Champney and the cellist Stephan Goerner, who with Daniel Levy on the piano will perform the Quintet for piano and strings op. 81, Dvorak String Quartet No. 14 "Death and the Maiden" by Schubert.

The programme also includes the presentation of the book "The Man who Whispers to the Vineyards. The true story of the Brunello of Montalcino that grows listening to Mozart" by Carlo Cignozzi, a document of specific and irrefutable evidence of the effects of classical music on plants. This special event will take place on Friday 22 July. The preview of the documentary by Gianni Padlina will also be presented and followed by a tasting of these special wines. The entrance is free.

The concerts will take place in the beautiful churches of Ascona, Santa Maria della Misericordia (Collegio Papio) and San Pietro e Paolo.

The Festival is organized by the International Academy of Euphony, Switzerland.

For further information we invite you to visit: www.academyofeuphony.com/festival/

Tickets are now on sale at www.ticketcorner.ch