Twentieth-century chamber music meets jazz, folk, and contemporary experimentation in the upcoming concerts at the LAC in Lugano, which between late May and early June offers two evenings dedicated to the fusion of different musical languages.
Sunday 31 May at 17pm in Room 1 of the LAC will go on stage Balagan, a project that brings together violinist Liya Petrova, clarinetist Pablo Barragán, and pianist Amadeus Wiesensee in a musical journey capable of crossing cultures, popular traditions, and European classical music.
The program unfolds around some of the most significant experiences of 20th-century chamber music, alternating compositions that intertwine popular rhythms, jazz influences, and timbre research. The concert will open with Suite for Violin, Clarinet and Piano, Op. 157b by Darius Milhaud, characterized by expressive lightness and rhythmic vivacity. This will be followed by Sonata for violin and piano in G minor L.140 by Claude Debussy, one of the last works of the French composer.
The first part will end with contrast by Béla Bartók, a piece that blends popular tradition and sound experimentation, enhancing the timbral possibilities of the three instruments through energetic and complex writing.
In the second part the audience will listen to the Sonatina for clarinet and piano by Joseph Horovitz, followed by the short Piece for violin and clarinet by Claude Vivier, a work with an evocative and highly experimental character. The concert will close with Trio for violin, clarinet and piano by Paul Schoenfield, a composition that recalls jazz and popular atmospheres, alternating virtuosic impulses and continuous changes of register.
Petrova, Barragán, and Wiesensee's interpretation aims to highlight this very plurality of musical languages, bringing out the dialogue between different cultural and stylistic traditions that runs through the repertoire chosen for the evening.
The event will also be accompanied by the last seasonal event of the Knitting Café, scheduled for 3:00 p.m. Over knitting, coffee, and informal conversation, participants will be able to share impressions and reflections on the day's musical program. Detailed information is available on the LAC official website.
The musical calendar will continue on Saturday 6 June at 21pm at the Jazz in Bess venue with a concert by the Manchester Collective, a British ensemble known for its ability to break down barriers between different musical genres.
The project entitled The Unfurrowed Field It offers an experience that blends jazz, folk, contemporary classical music, and improvisation, creating a dialogue between seemingly distant repertoires. The musical journey traverses the sounds of Scottish tradition, reworked by pianist Fergus McCreadie and violinist Donald Grant, and the sonic architectures of György Kurtág and Joseph Haydn.
Alongside these composers, there's also room for the experiments of Christian Mason and Anna Meredith, composers who interweave electronic elements, classical structures, and new forms of sound research. The result is a program that alternates rigorous writing with improvisational freedom, in keeping with the artistic philosophy of the English collective: creating immersive and transversal musical experiences capable of engaging diverse audiences.
The choice of songs reflects Manchester Collective's desire to build new connections between different musical worlds, keeping the human and shared dimension of live listening at its core.
