This year's Chamber Music Festival Oberlausitz (KMO) has to create additional capacity. With 1500 guests, it is already at full capacity before the start, as the organizers announced on Monday. For three of the total of ten concerts in castles and churches in the region, more tickets are to be offered, as for the opening this Friday with the Dresden Kreuzchor. At the third edition of Saxony's youngest classical music festival, more than 100 musicians from 12 countries will give guest performances in the Upper Lusatia-Lower Silesia cultural region.
The response exceeds "our wildest expectations," said artistic director Hagen W. Lippe-Weissenfeld. The audience is growing steadily across all generations, he said, and a solid base has been established. The "extraordinary interest and the wave of sympathy from our audience" is the greatest incentive for the festival's volunteer team and contributors, he said. These include renowned soloists such as mandolinist Avi Avital, violist Nils Mönkemeyer, clarinetist Dimitri Ashkenazy and cellist Jan Vogler.
