Between 25 October and 2 November 2022, the Haydneum – Hungarian Centre for Early Music will hold its Autumn Festival in Budapest. Founded in the summer of 2021, the institution was at this time last year preparing for its first, highly successful Opening Festival, followed in June 2022 by the inaugural Sacred Music Festival and in August by the String Quartets at Eszterháza series. Throughout the year, the Haydneum has also collaborated with many partners from Hungary’s classical music scene. Today, the institution embarks on its second season enriched with valuable experience and a wealth of memorable musical encounters.

The hallmark of this year’s Haydneum Autumn Festival is diversity. The audience will be treated to five concerts, each remarkable in its own genre. All performances will feature period instruments, and the central concept ensures that Joseph Haydn appears in every program, accompanied by another composer or location—reflected in the subtitles.

“Haydn and London” – The festival’s main attraction sees two outstanding period-instrument orchestras, Paris’s Le Concert de la Loge and Budapest’s Orfeo Orchestra, share the stage to recreate the grand orchestral sound of 1790s London. Adding to the excitement, both ensembles will perform without a conductor, under the concertmaster direction of world-renowned violinist Julien Chauvin. Such initiatives have been rare in Europe over the past fifty years, making this one of the festival’s unmissable evenings.

“Joseph and Michael Haydn” – On 28 October at the University Church, the Purcell Choir, accompanied only by continuo and conducted by György Vashegyi, will perform. Praised in superlatives by the international press for their sound and professionalism, the choir rarely appears without an orchestra. This program brings together the Haydn brothers: Joseph, with very few surviving continuo-accompanied sacred works, and Michael, with a wealth of them. The core of the program is formed by Michael Haydn’s Salzburg Lenten Masses from the 1790s, which the choir recorded years ago for Hungaroton to considerable international acclaim.

“Haydn and Zimmermann” – On 29 October, the festival welcomes Bratislava to the Beethoven Hall of the Carmelite Monastery, represented by Musica Aeterna. Alongside Haydn, they will introduce chamber works by Anton Zimmermann. A composer who spent much of his life in Bratislava, Zimmermann was among the few in 18th-century Hungary whose works—especially his symphonies—achieved wide dissemination. This concert will showcase larger-scale chamber works that are seldom heard today. Founded in 1973 and based in Bratislava, Musica Aeterna is ranked among Europe’s leading period-instrument ensembles, led by distinguished violinist Peter Zajíček.

“Haydn and Beethoven” – On 30 October in the Solti Hall of the Liszt Academy, a new genre makes its festival debut: solo fortepiano combined with song. The program features internationally acclaimed Hungarian artists, tenor Zoltán Megyesi and fortepianist Petra Somlai, performing sonatas and song cycles. This evening will be a particularly unique highlight of the series.

On 2 November in the Grand Hall of the Liszt Academy, the festival concludes with “Haydn and Metastasio”. This evening is special as the Haydneum presents an opera for the first time (in concert performance): L’isola disabitata, Metastasio’s only libretto set by Haydn. The Orfeo Orchestra will collaborate with outstanding Hungarian soloists Ágnes Kovács, Eszter Balogh, Márton Komáromi, and Szilveszter Szélpál, under the baton of György Vashegyi.

In sum, this year’s Haydneum Autumn Festival offers five extraordinary programs – we warmly welcome everyone to join us!