Antonio Vivaldi (1678 – 1741) -The Four Seasons in Venice
In Venice, just down the quayside from St. Mark’s Square, stands a building called Ospedale della Pieta on whose outer walls there is a hole just big enough to stick a bowling pin through.  Underneath reads a plaque which damns to hell the person who slips any infant other than a true orphan through that small passage to the indoors.  In this orphanage Vivaldi worked for most of his life, where he taught the girls who slipped through how to play music.  It was also here that he composed his incomparable The Four Seasons.
Besides teaching, Vivaldi was a virtuoso violinist as well as composer, and of his 500-plus concertos, 221 are for violin written most likely for himself.  Although it is unknown when the concertos of The Four Seasons were composed, they were first published in 1725 in a larger set titled The Test of Harmony and Invention.  Since then they have become so famous as to almost eclipse the composer himself — so rich in tunefulness and inventiveness, so exceptional in their virtuoso violin solos – indeed, their inspired beauty nearly defy time, place and composer.
One lesser-known aspect of the Seasons is that the orchestral parts are accompanied by detailed programs (storylines), which explain many of this timeless masterpiece’s ingeniously clever musical moments.
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Astor Piazzolla (1921 – 1992) – The Four Seasons in Buenos Aires
These pieces are the tribute of two 20th-century men (the Argentinean, Astor Piazzolla and the Russian, Leonid Desyatnikov) to an 18th-century Venetian master, Antonio Vivaldi.
Piazzolla was born in Mar del Plata, Argentina, on March 11, 1921. His parents were poor Italian immigrants who moved to New York City in 1924, affording the young Piazzolla extensive exposure to jazz artists like Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway. Although he became a pupil of classical composer Alberto Ginastera, he continued his association with jazz artists all his life.
From his teens, Piazzolla was the leader of a tango band.  He stalled for years as a composer. Piazzolla’s composition Buenos Aires won him a trip to Paris where the legendary teacher, Nadia Boulanger, convinced him that most of his “classical” music sounded like the work of other composers.  She encouraged him to look instead to the tango for inspiration.
The first concerto of The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires was written in 1965 after he returned to Argentina. The title references Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, but the tribute ends there. Vivaldi was fond of music that evokes specific pictures (dogs barking, storms, drunken peasants, birds); not so Piazzolla. The solo violin is essential to Vivaldi; Piazzolla did not write one in the piece. Then, in the 1990s, along came Desyatnikov.
The Seasons was something of an obsession with Desyatnikov.  He took Piazzolla’s originals and “Vivaldified” them, replicating Vivaldi’s orchestration — including the solo violin — and weaving in allusions to Vivaldi. He also added humor. When it is summer in Vivaldi’s Venice, it is winter in Piazzolla’s Buenos Aires. So you will hear bits of Vivaldi’s Summer worked into Piazzolla’s Winter.
Later in his life, Piazzolla moved to Italy but still performed all over the world. He brought to the tango many elements of sophisticated classical music: fugue, counterpoint, poly-rhythms and dissonances that surprised many listeners and infuriated some. Tragically, at the height of his career, he suffered a stroke in 1990 and died two years later in his beloved Buenos Aires, leaving an enormous legacy as one of South America’s greatest musical figures and a major composer of the 20th century.
musicprogramnotes.com

Yury Revich, violin & conductor
Yury Revich started playing the violin at age five and is now studying with Pavel Vernikov. He comes from a dynasty of violinists: his father, grandfather and greatgrandfather were all dedicated to the string
instrument. When Yury turned seven, he entered the Central Music Acadamy of the Moscow Conservatory as a student of Galina Turchaninova. Between 2005 and 2009, he studied under V. Pickaizen and then went to the Vienna Conservatory in 2009, where he is being taught by Pavel Vernikov.
Furthermore, his teachers in Vienna and Moscow included Yury’s father, A. Revich and V. Vorona.
Young Artist of the Year 2015 by the International Classical Music Awards, at only 23 years old, Yury Revich already is a very mature and serious artist. He is one of the most expressive musicians of his generation and is based in Vienna, Austria.
He is at performances in all corners of the world – in 2009, he played his debut at Carnegie Hall and in 2013 at La Scala, Milan, he also performed at the Berlin Konzerthaus, Vienna Musikverein, Vienna Konzerthaus, Laeiszhalle in Hamburg, Metropolitan Art Space Tokyo,Tchaikovsky Concert Hall, Cadogan Hall London as well as the Preston Bradley Hall in Chicago and many others, and can be heard at many international festivals – Yury tries to use his music for charitable events.
Together with the European-Russian Society for International Cooperation, where Yury functions as Artistic Director, he organized a concert in Vienna in 2011 for the victims of the tsunami in Japan. Additionally, he collaborates with the organisation „Kleine Herzen“ that helps Russian and Ukranian children.
Yury also lives out his creativity in the film medium: He is practicing to direct and to act and has already produced a short film of his own.
He records for Sony Classical, ARS, Odradek and OnePointFM , WDR, BR, Radio France, among many other European and American radio and television networks.
Yury is artist in residence of Aurora Star Festival, Bad Ragaz Festival etc.
Yury Revich is very versatile in his works: he finds it fascinating to play baroque music on historical instruments – for example with the harpsichordist Olga Fillipova – but equally enjoys working with  modern influences. In order to fully expand on his repertoire, Yury also plays as a chamber musician in ensembles with renowned artists such as Massimo Quatra, Gary Hoffman, Liana Isakadze, Lawrence Dutton, Robert McDuffie, Daniil Trifonov and others.
In 2015 Yury launched a new international concert cycle in Vienna “Friday Nights with Yury Revich” with artists like Paul Badura-Skoda, Pavel Vernikov, Alexey Igudesman, Kotaro Fukuma and many other celebrities taking part.
As a soloist with an orchestra, Yury performs with many Orchestras, including Svetlanov State Symphony, La Verdi Milano, North-West Deutsche Philarmonie, Il Pomeriggi Musicale, Zagreb Soloists, Russian National, Moscow Soloists and collaborates with conductors like Yuri Bashmet, Mikhail Pletnev, Zhang Xian, Gintaras Rinkevicius, Yuri Simonov, Justus Frantz and others.
Since 2008, Yury has been playing on a violin that was specifically built for him by the French master luthier Alan Karbonar, and now playing on a Balestrieri from 1783 which was generously placed at his disposal by the Goh Family Foundation in Singapore and the Amadeus International School in Vienna. Moreover, he was accorded the honor of performing on a Duke Alba Stradivari and a Guarneri del Gesu Ex-Max Rostal that were furnished by the Stradivari Society.
He is the Music Ambassador of the Amadeus Vienna International and Beethoven Center Vienna.
During his studies in Vienna Conservatory, Yury Revich founded the young quartet Quatuor
du Soleil“which, next to classical music, also plays romantic, baroque and contemporary pieces.

Georgian Strings
For the biography of Georgian Strings, please refer to the concert of March 1