Inaugurated in 2012, The Magic Lake Festival of Russian Classical Music, celebrating, ‘...the special ties between Russia’s rich cultural heritage and Switzerland,’ is organized by the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra and sponsored principally by the AVC Charity Foundation.

Numa Bischof-Ullmann, the festival’s artistic and executive director says: ‘In the 19th and the first half of the 20th Century, Lake Lucerne had a profound influence on the work of many renowned Russian musicians and writers, most notably, Sergey Rachmaninov, Aleksander Scriabin and Leo Tolstoy. But there are roles also ascribed to Lake Geneva (Lac Léman) in the works of Igor Stravinsky and Pyotr Tchaikovsky.’

‘The very name Magic Lake has a charm of its own — borrowed from Anatoly Liadov’s 1909 symphonic miniature, The Enchanted Lake, it seems to urge the desire to explore even the lesser known treasures of the Russian repertoire. But Inspired by the Swiss lakes, these days of Russian music in Lucerne breathe new life into the whole repertoire both of well-loved and hitherto unknown pages.’

More details can be found at the festival website.