Megaron Celebrates Georges Aperghis With 3 Nights of Radical Music

The Megaron Athens Concert Hall will celebrate the 80th birthday of Georges Aperghis with a three-day series exploring the work of one of contemporary music’s most influential innovators.

Running from October 9 to 11, the tribute will bring together trumpet player Marco Blaauw, cellist Valerie Fritz and the Ventus Ensemble for three distinct programs devoted to Aperghis and the unconventional musical world he has created.

The composer, known for challenging established ideas about contemporary music and musical theater, has made disruption a creative principle and surprise a method. The series aims to offer three different perspectives on his work — and will do so in an equally unconventional setting: at all three concerts, the audience will sit on the stage alongside the performers.

The unusual arrangement reflects a central element of Aperghis’ artistic approach. In his work, the boundary between performer and listener has never been taken for granted.

Marco Blaauw opens the series with an experimental trumpet recital

The series begins Friday, October 9, at 8:30 p.m. with a trumpet recital by Marco Blaauw, an adventurous performer who has explored the instrument in forms ranging from the ancient clay horn to the double-bell trumpet.

Janet Sinica ©Marco Blaauw

At the center of the program is Aperghis’ Trompe-Oreille, a new work for double-bell trumpet and electronics commissioned by IRCAM, the French institute dedicated to research and innovation in music and sound.

Described as an “acoustic illusion,” the work places the unusual double-bell trumpet alongside electronics to explore sound and perception.

Blaauw will also perform works by Elena Rykova and Arefeh Hekmatpanah, with sound design by Thomas Wegner.

The program includes Rykova’s Improvisation with clay horn, Hekmatpanah’s Vicissitudes and Residing, followed by Aperghis’ Trompe-Oreille for double-bell trumpet and electronics.

Blaauw performs trumpet, with Wegner responsible for electronics and sound design.

Valerie Fritz brings Bach, Ligeti and Aperghis together

On Saturday, October 10, at 8:30 p.m., Austrian cellist Valerie Fritz takes the stage for the second recital.

A rising star of the ECHO Rising Stars program, Fritz has developed a reputation for embracing unusual projects and working with contemporary composers, moving between the classical repertoire and works that push beyond conventional ideas of musical performance.

Valerie Fritz ©Dino Bossnini

Her program places Aperghis alongside works by Johann Sebastian Bach, György Ligeti, Jennifer Walshe, Sofia Avramidou, Kalliope Tsoupaki and Michael Gordon.

The performance will again feature Thomas Wegner on electronics and sound design, with Theano Papadaki making a special appearance on vocals.

Rather than separating the traditional and the experimental, the program brings them into direct conversation, reflecting the broad musical territory at the heart of the three-day tribute.

Theano Papadaki

Ventus Ensemble closes the tribute

The series concludes Sunday, October 11, at 8:30 p.m. with the Ventus Ensemble and vocalist Theano Papadaki.

The final program offers the most comprehensive portrait of Aperghis’ artistic world, bringing together sounds, images, fragments of speech and singing in a deliberately paradoxical and playful narrative.

Alongside works by Aperghis, the ensemble will perform music by his student Nikola Tzortzis and Luciano Berio’s legendary Sequenza.

Ventus Ensemble

Across three nights, the tribute moves from the experimental possibilities of the trumpet and electronics to the cello, voice and ensemble — offering three different ways into the work of a composer who has consistently questioned where music ends and theater, language, movement and performance begin.

All three concerts take place in the Christos Lambrakis Hall at the Athens Concert Hall, and at each performance, the audience will be seated onstage with the musicians.