Polish-American pianist Adam Golka (born 1987) first performed all of Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas when he was 18 years-old, and in 2020-2021 Adam Golka performed the cycle of Beethoven’s 32 Sonatas at the Bach Festival Society of Winter Park (Florida) and at Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue (NYC), in socially-distanced and live-stream formats. Adam’s performances of each Sonata were complemented by 32 short films he created, known as 32@32 (available on YouTube), documenting his preparation for climbing the Everest of piano literature and featuring an amalgam of distinguished guests, from an astrophysicist to Alfred Brendel. Adam Golka’s principal teachers have been José Feghali, with whom he studied at Texas Christian University, and Leon Fleisher, at the Peabody Conservatory. Since finishing his formal studies, Adam has continued to develop his artistry through mentorship from Alfred Brendel, Richard Goode, Murray Perahia, Mitsuko Uchida, Evelyne Crochet, Ferenc Rados, Rita Wagner, and Sir András Schiff, who invited Adam to give recitals at the Klavier-Festival Ruhr and Tonhalle Zürich, for the “Sir András Schiff Selects” concert series. Adam has also given solo recitals in Tokyo’s Musashino Hall, New York’s Alice Tully Hall (presented by the Musicians Emergency Fund), and Amsterdam’s Kleine Zaal in Het Concertgebouw. As a concerto soloist, he has appeared with dozens of orchestras, including the BBC Scottish Symphony, NACO (Ottawa), Warsaw Philharmonic, NFM Leopoldinum, Shanghai Philharmonic, as well as the San Francisco, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Milwaukee, Indianapolis, New Jersey, and San Diego symphonies in the US, among many others. Adam has enjoyed collaborations with conductors such as Joseph Swensen, Donald Runnicles, Pinchas Zukerman, Mark Wigglesworth, and his brother, conductor Tomasz Golka. Adam gave his Carnegie Stern Auditorium début in 2010 with the New York Youth Symphony. Chamber music is an integral part of Adam Golka’s life, and he has performed repeatedly at the Krzyżowa-Music “Music for Europe” festival, which has included tour performances at the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and the Beethoven Bonn festivals, as well as Konzerthaus Berlin. He also performed at the Marlboro, Ravinia, Caramoor chamber music festivals in the US. Adam collaborates regularly with the Manhattan Chamber Players and in recital with baritone John Moore, pianist Yannick Rafalimanana, cellist Jonathan Swensen and violinist Itamar Zorman, with whom he recently debuted at The Wigmore Hall in London. Adam’s professional life began when he was awarded the first prize and audience prize at the 2nd China Shanghai International Piano Competition. In 2009, he won the Max I. Allen Fellowship from American Pianists Association. As a pedagogue, he acted as Artist-in-Residence for six school years at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts. Adam has recorded works by Beethoven, Schumann, and Brahms for London-based First Hand Records and he has premiered works composed for him by Richard Danielpour, Michael Brown, Michelle Barzel Ross, and Jarosław Gołębiowski. He recently recorded the world premiere of the Piano Quintet (2023) by Andrea Casarrubios. Starting in Fall 2024, Adam will be Artist-Teacher at the Longy School of Music of Bard College in Cambridge, MA.

is an Albanian pianist based in Paris. Passionate about the transmission of musical language and communication through it, she has dedicated her career to piano performance and teaching. She has a special interest for multidisciplinary performances, where she finds a free creative and interpretative platform. As a result, in 2018, her performance “Alter” was created as an interaction of music with theater and visual-digital projections and it was premiered both in Albania and Kosovo. Since 2017 Rea has been entrusted with the management and the artistic direction of several musical and pedagogical projects within the Conservatories where she teaches. She completed the first twelve years of piano studies in Tirana with Valbona Simixhiu and Anita Tartari, during which she was awarded in national and international piano competitions. Later, she continued her superior studies and graduated at Conservatorio Superior de Castellon with Leonel Morales in Spain and at Ecole Normale de Musique “Alfred Cortot” and Schola Cantorum with Marian Rybicki, Nina Patarcec and Billy Eidi in France. Rea has performed in various concerts and festivals in France, Spain, Italy, Kosovo and Albania.

Deniz Unel is a Turkish-Italian flutist born in 1996 in Istanbul, Turkey. She obtained her licence (DNSPM) in flute in the class of Vincent Lucas at the Pôle Supérieur Paris Boulogne-Billancourt (PSPBB) and in Musicology at the Sorbonne University. Alongside her flute studies, she is currently in her fourth year of lyric singing at the Conservatoire de Saint-Denis (Paris). She has won several prizes at international competitions, and in chamber music she won first prize with the Istanbul Flute Quartet at the International Chamber Music Competition in Bulgaria and a special prize from the Bulgarian Foundation for Music and Dance in 2013. Unel has performed chamber music concerts with the Istanbul Flute Quartet and the Flute and Harp Duo in venues such as the Süreyya Opera House and the Caddebostan Cultural Center. She has also taken part in festivals such as Flütistan, İstanbul Woodwind Festival (Turkey), Beethoven Fest (Germany) and MusicAlp (France). She has given recitals in Turkey and France. She performed Mozart’s Concerto for Flute and Harp in 2018 as soloist with the Orchestre de Chambre Nouvelle Europe. Unel took part in the “Générations France Musique” program with a trio of voice, flute and piano in 2019. Unel is currently a member of the d’Cybeles ensemble since 2023 with the show “Oum Pa Pa” directed by Philippe Lafeuille, which has been touring in France and in Norway. She began her professional studies at the Istanbul State University Conservatory at the age of 11 in Halit Turgay’s class, where she continued for 9 years. In 2016, she continued her studies at the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris Alfred Cortot with an ENMP scholarship in the class of Jean Ferrandis, where she obtained the Diplôme Supérieur de Concertiste in 2020.

The Characteristic Polyphonic Group of Himara formed by Katina Beleri, Alqiviadh Koci, Ilia Gjokrushi, Arben Zoto and Themistokli Polo continuesto keep alive the caracteristic and tradition of Himara’s Iso-Polyphony and for thirty-seven years they have been carefully performing and promoting this rare musical and cultural value of our nation within the country and abroad, thus becoming the winner of several national and international awards.

Bruno Tomasello is an Italian saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist who finds his musical investigation field in the relationship between the Alto Saxophone and the popular and ethnic music and instruments. He has been engaged for years in the research on total improvisation and on the development of extended techniques as well as new timbres for the saxophone. A personal artistic path and work that led him to collaborate with various artists in the recording of albums and live performances. In 2018, he recorded a full live album based on instantaneous composition and improvisation during a concert with the presence of the audience at the Auditorium Novecento Napoli studios with his duo: the StereoRebus.

The development of extended techniques on the alto saxophone is its main characteristic: the ability to modify the timbre of his instrument gave him the opportunity to access and attend the Afghan music seminar (in Houdetsi – Crete – at the Labyrinth headquarters in August 2023) held by master Ustad Daud Khan Sadozai, the Afghan Rubab leading expert, where for the first time the Master has allowed a saxophonist to participate to the lessons in a class of ten Rubab players. In October of the same year he attended the seminar on Ottoman Makam held by Ross Daly (founder of Labyrinth Musical Workshop) and Kelly Thoma in the context of the international project “Reshaping the Tradition”, conducted by the Accademia Musicale Chigiana with the consultancy of Labyrinth Italia. Since February 2024 he has become one of the Turkish ney students of Master Prof. Murat Salim Tokaç, recognized in Turkey as one of the greatest experts in ney and tanbur and holder of the chair as a teacher of these instruments and Manager of the Conservatory at the University of Haliç in Istanbul.

With his instantaneous composition solo project called “Call me Ishmael”, born in the summer of 2022, he toured various Italian regions finding an interest and having the honor of opening the Vinicio Capossela concert on New Year’s Eve (31/12 /2022) organized by the cultural association Verso Sud in Corato (BA). He counts in his artistic career several collaborations including Francesco Di Bella (24Grana singer and leader) Peppe Leone (frame drum player and percussionist of Vinicio Capossela), Valeria Sturba (internationally renowned thereminist), Tonino Tremila, Fabiana Martone (singer of Nu Genea), Alessio Arena (Neapolitan/Spanish singer-songwriter and writer), Dileo (Italian singer-songwriter with whom he opened Michael Kiwanuka’s concert during the Barezzi festival at the Teatro Regio in Parma), Leonardo Gallato (Sicilian singer-songwriter and poet), Luigi Scialdone (multi-instrumentalist with whom he collaborates as co-author of songs and as saxophonist for film soundtracks), Luca Iavarone (creative director of Fanpage.it), Pier Foschi (historic drummer of Jovanotti), and many others.

Born in Himara, Albania, Marios Tzavellas had the stroke of creativity from an early age, nurturing his innate talent at the Academy of Fine Arts in Tirana before moving to Greece thereafter to continue an international career. Having experimented with various mediums and techniques over the years, Tzavellas mostly works with oil and watercolor, and has completed more pieces of art than he can recall. Inspired by the rugged Mediterranean landscape, sea and sun, Tzavellas presents a collection ranging from realism to abstract in vibrant colors. Tzavellas’ art has been featured at various galleries in Athens, Kerkyra, Preveza, USA, Netherlands and Tirana. The artist has taught in Rotterdam and Amsterdam, and has created sculptures for a traditional apokriatiko carnival in Chalkida. His murals adorn the Royal Caribbean International’s Anthem of the Seas, Symphony of the Seas and Harmony of the Seas.