International Music Festival

This Holy Week, Colombia’s capital hosts the first International Music Festival. The biennial festival, created as a counterpart to the city’s world-renowned Ibero-American Theater Festival, will feature a different composer, musical genre or artist every two years. For this year’s festival, Bogotá is Beethoven, meaning that 420 artists in 56 concerts at 12 venues will celebrate the composer’s works.

Among the noted guests this year are Russian violinist Viktoria Mullova, pianist Boris Bezerovsky, the Simón Bolívar Quartet from Venezuela and vocal soloists Nohora Amsellen, Alison Cook, Martin Muehle and Jukka Rasilainen, who will perform Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony along with the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra. Colombian invitees include the Bogotá Philharmonic Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra of Colombia, and the Choir of the Opera of Colombia, among many others.

Perhaps the most interesting take on the featured composer’s formidable oeuvre, three Colombian artists – jazz musician Antonio Arnedo and Latin-fusion groups Mojarra Eléctrica and Puerto Candelaria – will debut decidedly modern interpretations (with an unmistakable South American flair) of Beethoven’s works during the Festival’s Noche en Blanco, an all-night celebration involving food, cocktails and plenty of concerts.

For more on the theater festival: Bogotá is Beethoven and www.bogotaesmusica.com

March 27-30
Multiple venues
Tickets from $10,000 pesos (some free concerts)