35th Milano Musica Festival 2026 Lontananze creative

The 35th Milano Musica Festival Lontananze creative presents a configuration of concerts that – honouring two very different protagonists such as Morton Feldman and György Kurtág, both born in 1926 and both also connected to the writings of Samuel Beckett – compares the experiments and constructions of new dimensions of listening by later generations.

In today's wide-open situation, the theme of the creative potential of the far away can be approached in different ways: from an interest in discovering other cultures and new technologies to the combination of repertoires and authors who experiment with rare microtonal intonations and explore the sound and expressive possibilities of new acoustic and electric instruments.

The concerts at Teatro alla Scala, with international commissions and co-commissions, show different “creative distances”.

Pianist Filippo Gorini presents the results of his 7 Cities artistic residencies project, where the traditional soloist's travel routine turns into a search for experiences and exchanges. The project includes new works commissioned from composers, including Beat Furrer and Stefano Gervasoni.

In the concert by Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della Rai, soloist Minh-Tâm Nguyen of Les Percussions de Strasbourg, conductor Michele Gamba – in a programme that will also be presented in Turin for Rai NuovaMusica – Carmine Emanuele Cella explores the perspective of an orchestra of the future with When the moon of mourning is set, a concerto for augmented vibraphone and large orchestra, in world premiere. Also premiered in Italy is I don't know how to cry by Georg Friedrich Haas.

Before both concerts, a chamber music programme “in echo”: Gervasoni and Peter Eötvös, with his The Sirens Cycle for soprano and string quartet as a prelude to the symphonic Siren's song.

Monographic evenings are dedicated to Kurtág and Feldman, respectively with the two cycles Scenes from a Novel and ...pas à pas - nulle part... with the Hungarian Contemporary Music Ensemble conducted by Gregory Vajda, and with Neither, opera in one act for soprano and orchestra on a libretto by Samuel Beckett, rarely performed in Italy, with the Orchestra di Padova e del Veneto conducted by Marco Angius, and with the extensive Trio for violin, cello and piano, performed by Trio di Parma.

Within the prestigious Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition, the Maurizio Pollini Special Prize has been established for the first time in 2025, conceived and promoted by Milano Musica with the aim of projecting the luminous human and artistic example of the Milanese pianist to younger generations. The prize, awarded this year to Chinese pianist Yungyung Guo, consists of €5,000 and a subsequent concert at the festival.

Trio Abstrakt, with its original combination of saxophone, percussion and piano, the Ensemble Azione Improvvisa, with accordion, electric guitar, tiorba and electronics, and the Schalffeld Ensemble present premieres of works by Alberto Posadas, Jérôme Combier, Silvia Borzelli, Milica Djordjevic, Benjamin Scheuer, Mikel Urquiza, Giovanni Bertelli.

New worksfor soloists and electronics are premiered at Pirelli HangarBicocca, thanks to the collaboration with Ircam: Trompe-oreilles for trumpet and electronics by Georges Aperghis, performed by Marco Blaauw; Aranyaka for cello, piano and electronics by Riccardo Nova and Nodo infinito by Justė Janulytė for cello and electronics, with Francesco Dillon and Emanuele Torquati.