The gathering, centring around simultaneous instrument exhibition rooms as well as meetings and round tables on different subjects of instrument making, this year features some novelties. Most significant is a first-time exhibition titled “NotAntica”, dedicated to makers of instruments from the Renaissance, baroque, and early classical periods, which includes a large selection of bowed, plucked, wind and keyboard instruments.

This early instrument exhibition will be complemented by a meeting on baroque music and violin making, presenting the results of the courses on the subject began the previous year, and concluding with a performance by early music specialist Roberto Gini and students from the period performance practice course.

Other presentations will include a seminar on instrument varnish and a meeting featuring a comparison between the harpsichord and the fortepiano, with Naoko Misumo playing works by Domenico Scarlatti. Guitarists Stefano Grondona and Giampaolo Bandini will play instruments by the exhibitors, complemented by a round table organized by Amadeus magazine and featuring Lorenzo Micheli, Leopoldo Saracino and Marco Riboni.

The lute will also be object of a round table on 4 October with lutenists Francesco Romano and Massimo Lonardi, again organised by Amadeus, in collaboration with the Fondazione Marco Fodella. Centrepiece during the exhibition will be the session on fundamental issues regarding conservatories of music and the inter-relationshp with basic and high-level music education, chaired by Daniele Martino, Assistant Director of Il Giornale della Musica.

Speakers include Bruno Civello, Director General of AFAM; Bruno Carioti, President of the Conservatory of Music Directors Conference; Elio Ghezzi, Director of Parma Conservatory of Music; Alberto Baldrighi, Director of the Cremona “Istituto Musicale Pareggiato”; Anna Fellegara, Foundation “Scuole Civiche di Milano”; Salvatore Accardo, Cremona Walter Stauffer Foundation and Bruno Cagli, President-Superintendent of the National Academy Santa Cecilia in Rome.

Concerts include a preview of the performance on 3 October by the Chicago Fine Arts Quartet at the Camera di Commercio in Cremona; the Stradivari Foundation Master-class young Quartets, and the Young Talents Marathon featuring students from the Foundation of Rome Santa Cecilia Academy, the Cremona Walter Stauffer Foundation, and the International Academy of Music of Milan, among others, which will perform music by Elgar, Ligeti, Berio and Varèse.

Further information at www.cremonamondomusica.it