The Enchanted Flute – “Twenty Shades of Music”
Extraordinary Tour of Flautist Ion Bogdan Ștefănescu
Flautist Ion Bogdan Ștefănescu is going back on the road in an extraordinary tournament. From June 3 to June 10, he will preform six recitals in six cities across the three historical provinces of Romania. The Enchanted Flute 2018 marks the 100th anniversary of the Great Union of the Romanian provinces in Alba Iulia, an opportunity for Ion Bogdan Ştefănescu and guitarist Costin Soare to prepare a special repertoire under the theme “Twenty Shades of Music.”
The repertoire includes songs by Celso Machado, Béla Bártok, Astor Piazzolla, and Miroslav Tadic, and guitar solos by Ariel Ramirez and Jorge Morel to be interpreted by Costin Soare.
The annual occurrence of the Enchanted Flute tournament ever since 2012 – sometimes with even two editions per season – has imposed it on the maps of the cultural events that already have a history and tradition.
This year’s program brings to the public’s attention a music that belongs to the Southern countries, a music with certain characteristics to be found only in the Balkans and South America. These are geographically remote areas, but very closely related from a semantic standpoint and in terms of their artistic structure. There are twenty facets, or music states that will be explored by those present in the audience at the Enchanted Flute recitals. They will listen to a music full of lasciviousness, sadness, resignation, longing, but also exuberance, playfulness, humor, and even innocence, feelings that define both the Romanian and the South American folklore.
Starting with 2012, Ion Bogdan Ştefănescu has visited dozens of cities in Romania accompanied by the pianist Horia Mihail. The two virtuosos also sang together in Washington, New York, Osaka, and Tokyo, in a program called “100% Romanian”. This time, Ion Bogdan Ştefănescu will be accompanied by one of Romania’s most prominent guitarists, Costin Soare, a musician who studied in Romania, Scotland, and Japan, a unique presence in the Romanian musical landscape. The mélange of tonalities, of flute and guitar, is very adequate for this repertoire. Ion Bogdan Ştefănescu will use a wide variety of flutes, from bass to piccolo, in a perfect symbiosis with the extraordinarily appealing sound of the guitar.
“I’m sure the music lovers will have a very positive reaction to this new acoustic formula. I consider it to be the perfect formula,” says Ion Bogdan Ştefănescu.
