Unexpected Encounters is an event organized in collaboration with the International Piano Festival of Brescia Bergamo and Bergamo Jazz.
The International Piano Festival of Brescia and Bergamo is one of the world’s most important events dedicated to the piano, intended both as a solo instrument and as a prestigious member of large orchestras.Conceived by Maestro Agostino Orizio, the first edition of the Festival was held in 1964 to test international pianism, and has now been hosting the most famous orchestras and soloists in the splendid settings of the Grand Theatre in Brescia and the Donizetti Theatre Bergamo for over fifty years. The Festival hosts not only some of the greatest pianists - to mention a few, Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, protagonist of the first five editions, to Magaloff, from Richter to Arrau, Pollini, Ashkenazy, Radu Lupu, Zimerman, Brendel, Martha Argerich, Evgenij Kissin, Grigory Sokolov - but also musicians, singers and conductors of the calibre of Mstislav Rostropovich, Mischa Maisky, Uto Ughi, Luciano Pavarotti, Riccardo Muti, Claudio Abbado, Gergiev, Giulini, Sawallisch, Solti, Maazel Chung. Among the orchestras, there are the Berliner Philharmoniker, the Wiener Philharmoniker, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the London Symphony, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Philharmonic of Israel, the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, the Nationale de France, the Orchestra of the Academy of Santa Cecilia in Rome, the Philharmonic of the Scala.
The long history of the Jazz Festival of Bergamo, one of the most relevant of the sector in Europe, can be divided in two parts: the fist, from 1969 to the early ‘80s, named ‘International Festival of Jazz’ and organized by the Italian Local Tourist Office; the second, from 1991 and on, under the aegis of Bergamo Jazz and Teatro Donizetti. There’s an ideal, unbreakable bond between the ‘old’ and the ‘new’ Festival: the same artistic thread which, by virtue of a proactive approach, mirrors the various, coexisting souls of jazz. Numerous international artists have taken part in the Festival: Dizzy Gillespie, Keith Jarrett, Gerry Mulligan, Charles Mingus, Art Ensemble of Chicago, Max Roach, Herbie Hancock, Archie Shepp, Ornette Coleman, Gato Barbieri, John Scofield, Jim Hall, McCoy Tyner, Bill Frisell, Jan Garbarek and many more. Since 2006, the Artistic Direction of Bergamo Jazz has been assigned to an important international musician and the current Artistic Director is the American saxophonist Joe Lovano.
