Two Zagreb cultural institutions – the Zagreb Soloists and the Museum of the City of Zagreb – collaborated to create a retrospective exhibition about the most famous Croatian, world-renowned classical music ensemble.
The Zagreb Soloists Ensemble was founded in 1953, and held its first concert in January 1954, organized by Radiotelevision Zagreb, under the artistic direction of the famous cellist Antonij Janigar. The exhibition in the Museum of the City of Zagreb is the crown of the celebration of a significant jubilee, the 65th anniversary of the continuous work of the ensemble.
Invitation to the Exhibition “Zagreb Soloists” in the Museum of the City of Zagreb
The successful multi-decade work of the Zagreb soloists is the product of the joint efforts of the members of this renowned ensemble, where the top level of performance and unfailing enthusiasm and love for classical music, especially chamber music, are their distinguishing marks.
Exhibition “Zagreb soloists” in the Museum of the City of Zagreb
So far, the Zagreb soloists have held about 4,000 concerts on five continents, in the world’s largest centers and most famous concert halls, such as Musikverein (Vienna), Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Royal Festival Hall (London), Berlin Philharmonic Hall, Tchaikowski Hall (Moscow ), Santa Cecilia (Rome), Carnegie Hall (New York), Opera House (Sydney), Victoria Hall (Geneva), Teatro Real (Madrid), Teatro Colon (Buenos Aires), etc. They were regular guests at famous music festivals such as in Salzburg, Prague, Edinburgh, Berlin, Bergen…
They recorded almost a hundred discography releases, as an ensemble or in collaboration with guest, celebrated soloists.
The Zagreb soloists have been meticulously collecting documentation and valuable archival material from numerous performances around the world for more than sixty-five years. We are talking about posters, invitations, photos, program booklets and awards and prizes. This material is being presented to the public for the first time in an exhibition at the Museum of the City of Zagreb as a testimony to the work of one of the longest-running chamber ensembles in the world, an important Zagreb and national art institution.
Exhibition “Zagreb soloists” in the Museum of the City of Zagreb
The Museum of the City of Zagreb is one of the few cultural institutions in Croatia that systematically deals with exhibition projects related to performing artists and art. The framework for this is certainly the collections within the Museum: The Theater Collection and the Collection of Zagreb Music Legends. With the exhibition on Zagreb soloists, the Museum of the City of Zagreb continues a series of studio exhibitions on Croatian musicians, this time trying to show visitors the existence and significance of the famous chamber music ensemble. The exhibition is conceived as a kind of musical-educational time machine, where numerous photos of Soloists’ performances, posters, awards, sound carriers and reproductions of performances from the most important concerts create the impression of a “music festival”. Interactive and multimedia contents at the exhibition help visitors to understand the power of creating and the skill of reproducing music on the instruments by which the Zagreb soloists are recognizable.