Kurtágiana

Kurtágiana – Concert of the SALT New Music Festival

SALT Soloists

A musical celebration of György Kurtág at 100, exploring artistic proximity across generations through homage, memory, and close listening.

Kurtágiana celebrates György Kurtág in the year of his 100th birthday through a constellation of musical memories, affinities, and homages.

Robert Schumann’s Märchenerzählungen stands beside Kurtág’s Hommage à R. Sch., where the music of an earlier composer becomes the starting point for an intensely personal response. Marco Stroppa’s Hommage à Gy. K. carries that gesture forward, turning toward Kurtág himself and extending the conversation across another generation.

The idea of homage then opens outward. Ana Sokolović’s Prelude and Fugue for GG, written as a tribute to Glenn Gould, approaches musical memory from a Canadian perspective, while Linda Catlin Smith’s intimate A Nocturne brings another voice—and another kind of concentrated listening—into the circle.

Excerpts from Kurtág’s Signs, Games, Messages return us to the composer at the centre of the program: music of extraordinary compression, where a gesture, a silence, or a handful of notes can contain an entire world.

Together, these works reflect SALT 2026: PROXIMITY as a closeness across time—between composers and their predecessors, between performers and the music they inhabit, and between memories of the past and sounds made present.

PROGRAM

Robert Schumann: Märchenerzählungen

György Kurtág: Hommage à R. Sch.

Marco Stroppa: Hommage à Gy. K.

Linda Catlin Smith: A Nocturne

Ana Sokolović: Prelude and Fugue for GG

György Kurtág: Excerpts from Signs, Games, Messages

ABOUT THE PERFORMERS

SALT Soloists brings together musicians connected to the festival for an evening of chamber and solo music centred on the work and artistic legacy of György Kurtág.

ABOUT SALT NEW MUSIC FESTIVAL

The SALT New Music Festival is a contemporary music festival based in Victoria, BC, bringing together British Columbian, Canadian, and international composers and performers.

The 2026 edition explores the theme of Proximity—closeness to one another, to nature, to the universe, and across differences of background, nationality, identity, and generation. Through concerts, outdoor events, movement, and shared listening, SALT creates encounters where new music becomes a space for connection, exchange, and discovery.

📅 Sunday, September 20, 2026 | 7:30 PM
📍 Phillip T. Young Recital Hall, University of Victoria
B125, MacLaurin Building, University of Victoria, Ring Rd, Victoria, BC V8P 5C2

In cooperation with the Sonus Foundation for the Support of New Music and Contemporary Performing Arts.