Under the motto LOVE IS STRONGER THAN FORCE, the 28th edition of Banchetto Musicale will present selected various programs in which Love plays the main part, in the complexity of its aspects, roles, and colours.

The festival will be opened with the newly composed opera “Il ratto di Helena” over Puccitelli’s surviving libretto, which saw the light of day in Vilnius in 1636. Composed by Marco Vitale, the opera was prepared within the last months by an international team of artists, from which the most are residents in Lithuania and Poland, as it must have been the case in Vilnius of the seventeenth century.

The second program in this festival, “Florilegium portense” will let the audiences dive in a completely different world of sounds. Organ duet Aušra Pinkevičienė and Vidas Pinkevičius will perform intabulations of motets which were printed during the thirty years’ war.

Ensemble CordAria will also guide the audiences through the time of the thirty years’ war, following in the footsteps of Biagio Marini, a composer whose ingenuity and revolutionary style of composition set new milestones in the music history.

Ensemble Morgaine turns another page of Lithuanian history with their new program “Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied”, dedicated to the glorious musical life of the 16th and 17th centuries Königsberg: a vivid city with a high level of intellectuality, artistry and creativity.

Contrasto armonico and Marcel Beekman prepared a program which granted our festival the title for this edition, with which they will tell us the tragic story of Tancredi and Clorinda from Monteverdi’s feather.

Soprano Rūta Vosyliūtė, accompanied by Collegium Musicum Riga, will present in this festival her new theatricalised program “Dramma da capo”, in which the audience will experience the variety and complexity of the Baroque affects in which Love is the driving force.

A concert experience of a different nature will be offered by nyckelharpa performer Didier François, where the audiences will let themselves surrounded by the magical sounds of this fascinating instrument.

The Medieval era will be present in this year’s edition with two distinguished performances: Ensemble Jerycho, under the direction of Bartosz Izbicki, which will display with their program “Vox nostra” the monumental singing practice of the lost times; and Enrike Solinís & Euskal Barrokensemble, who will perform their crossover program “Il Decameron – The Story of Nastagio degli Onesti”.

A children’s concert will again be present in our festival. Our little guests, together with their families, are welcome to attend the representation of “The Battle of the Music Notes” by ensemble CordAria.

The festival's concerts will be taking place in Vilnius on September 8–27, 2018, at the National Museum – Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania, the Museum of Applied Arts and Design, the Franciscan Monastery Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church, and at the Sts. Johns’ Church.