January 19, 2010
Festival director Per Boye Hansen hosted a programme launch where showmanship and acrobatics were center stage.
The ballroom in the dignified Logen theatre was packed as the festival director presented the rich programme. An important of inspiration for this year’s festival has been the relationship between thrills and chills. Naturally then, the programme launch kicked off with a trailer from the show Inside Out featuring the biggest modern circus in the Nordic countries, Cirkus Cirkör.
– This is an amazing show with fantastic circus acts, thrilling action and live pop music. We simply had to put it on during this year’s festival, says Boye Hansen, who even tried his hand at a little circus act himself at the launch: fire breathing.
Excerpts from the dance performance JAMSÍIS by Hallgrim Hansegård were also shown. Hansegård is known for his acrobatics and revitalization of Norwegian folk dance traditions. This year’s dance programme also includes performances by Jo Strømgren Kompani, Paul Taylor Dance Company and Carte Blanche.
The Bergen International Festival presents art in all genres, but classical music is always central to the programme. This year’s programme contains several genre concert series. The Håkon’s Hall will play host to chamber music, while the churches feature early music presented by Les Musiciens du Louvre-Grenoble, Paolo Pandolfo, Jaap ter Linden and others. Les Musiciens du Louvre-Grenoble will perform all of Bach’s Brandenburger concertos and Jaap ter Linden all of his cello suites. Schumann also features prominently in the programme, and violinist and conductor Nikolaj Znaider performs his four symphonies with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra.
Other artists include Eivind Gullberg Jensen and the NDR Radiophilharmonie, Gabriela Montero, who will give two concerts, and Norwegian Wagner-singer Terje Stensvold, who will appear with the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra.
The Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, one of the oldest symphony orchestras in the world, will together with the Philip Glass Ensemble be performing the European premiere of the orchestral version of the cult film Koyaanisqatsi.