The Latvian National Symphony Orchestra’s (LNSO) artist-in-residence this season, Vineta Sareika, together with LNSO’s string section, gave an emotionally moving concert program on 28 February at the Dzintari Concert Hall in Jūrmala and on 1 March at the “Latvija” Concert Hall in Ventspils, performing works by Samuel Barber, Franz Schubert and Karl Amadeus Hartmann.
In the concerts “Vineta Sareika and the LNSO Strings,” the outstanding and internationally acclaimed violinist took on the role of leading the performance. Throughout the concerts, the musicians guided the audience through some of humanity’s most fragile and profound experiences, while also offering notes full of faith and hope.
The program included Samuel Barber’s famous and cathartic Adagio for Strings, which grew out of the second movement of the composer’s only string quartet. Also performed was Karl Amadeus Hartmann’s “Concerto funebre,” written in response to the annexation of Czechoslovakia during World War II, and an arrangement for string orchestra of Franz Schubert’s string quartet “Death and the Maiden.”
Violinist Vineta Sareika is one of the brightest points of pride in Latvian academic music. She has built a broad and varied career: performing as a soloist, serving as first violin of the prestigious Artemis Quartet, working as a professor and competition jury member; she has recently concluded her tenure as concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra (the first female concertmaster in the orchestra’s history), and is also a multiple ECHO Klassik award winner. This season – LNSO’s 99th – Vineta Sareika is the orchestra’s artist-in-residence. The musician’s international success began in 2009, when she became a laureate of the Queen Elisabeth Competition of Belgium. Vineta Sareika plays a violin built by the famous violin maker Antonio Stradivari in 1683.
The concerts were financially supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation. Photo reportage from Dzintari: Janis Porietis. Photo reportage from Ventspils: Kristaps Anskens.