Our readers already know the artistic quality and unique atmosphere of the Meleagris Festival. As we approach the new series of concerts, we asked Artistic Director and pianist Magda Nikolaidou to tell us about the upcoming program.
Dear Ms. Nikolaidou, before we present the new program, we would like you to give us a brief description of what the Meleagris Festival is.
The Meleagris Art Festival was born from the desire to create a space where music is not just another concert event, but a complete experience of listening and gathering. For this reason, from the beginning, we sought to combine high artistic quality with an atmosphere of hospitality, sociability, and meaningful communication with the audience.
How is this expressed in practice?
The concerts take place at the Meleagris Estate, in an environment of exceptional natural beauty and a space of high aesthetic value, where the listener can approach music in a more direct and meaningful way. In this sense, the Meleagris Festival aims to create the conditions for a deeper listening experience, as well as for a human encounter centered around music.
For this year, the Meleagris Festival 2026 proposes a “unified musical journey” with a historically reverse course. What are the stops on this journey?
The Meleagris Festival 2026 is structured as a unified musical journey that moves from late Romanticism towards the deeper spiritual roots of Western music. The four festival concerts function as successive stops on this path.
The first concert is dedicated to the piano of late Romanticism. Pianist Ioannis Potamousis performs Musical Moments, Op. 16 by Sergei Rachmaninov and the monumental Sonata in B minor by Franz Liszt, two works that reveal different but complementary aspects of the Romantic aesthetic: on the one hand, Rachmaninov’s profound lyrical intensity and melodic generosity, and on the other, Liszt’s dramatic architecture and visionary power. It is a program that highlights the piano as an instrument of personal expression and as a vehicle for grand formal and spiritual ideas.
The second concert focuses on the chamber music of Johannes Brahms, where Romantic expression meets the formal discipline of the classical tradition. The program highlights different facets of the composer’s writing through three significant sonatas: the Sonata No. 1 for Clarinet and Piano in F minor, Op. 120 No. 1, the Sonata No. 1 for Cello and Piano in E minor, Op. 38, and the Sonata No. 3 for Violin and Piano in D minor, Op. 108. The works are performed by Dimitris Kyranastasis (clarinet), Henryka Tronek (violin), Christophoros Mirosnikof (cello), and Nasos Grozas (piano), revealing through the dialogue of the instruments a world of musical thought characterized by introspection, balance, and profound expressive intensity.
The third concert presents a special violin and piano recital with two significant personalities of the international music scene: violinist Alissa Margulis and pianist Lily Maisky. The program illuminates the poetic world of German Romanticism through works by Clara Schumann, Robert Schumann, and Johannes Brahms. Clara Schumann’s Three Romances, Robert Schumann’s Fantasiestücke, and Brahms’s Sonata No. 2 for Violin and Piano outline a common artistic horizon of lyricism and introspection, while the concert concludes with two movements from the F.A.E. Sonata, a work written as a tribute to the great violinist Joseph Joachim and capturing the spirit of artistic collaboration of that era.
The festival concludes with “Bach’s Antho…logy!“, a concert dedicated to Johann Sebastian Bach, which takes place the day after World Music Day, symbolically extending its celebration. The evening opens with the Suite No. 3 for Solo Cello (BWV 1009) with soloist Christophoros Mirosnikof. This is followed by the Concerto for Piano in F minor (BWV 1056) and the Concerto for Piano in D minor (BWV 1052) with the Sinfonietta Athinon under the musical direction of George Aravidis and myself as piano soloist. The program also includes the famous Air from Orchestral Suite No. 3 (BWV 1068), while the concert concludes with two chorales from cantatas BWV 56 (Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen) and BWV 147 (Jesus bleibet meine Freude), performed by the vocal ensemble of the Erateio Conservatory.
This is a program that traces a cohesive path from the final flourishing of Romanticism back to the initial sources of the classical tradition. For this reason, it is worth attending all the concerts. Also, your events uniquely combine music with sociability, gastronomy, and the natural environment. What prompted this choice?
The idea arose from the desire to bring music back into a more human context of experience. Historically—especially in chamber music—listening was never an isolated activity, but was connected with gathering, dialogue, and shared experience. At the Meleagris Festival, we strive to create precisely this atmosphere: a space where music, the natural landscape, conversation, and gastronomy organically coexist. In this sense, the festival is not limited to the concert as an event, but proposes a comprehensive cultural experience.
Looking back briefly, what do you take away from past events, and what do you hope for the future?
What I take away most from past events is the feeling that a real community is beginning to form around the Meleagris Festival — an audience that returns every year not only for the concerts, but for the experience created around them.
For the future, my wish is for the Meleagris Festival to continue to evolve in the same way: with deep respect for music, with the participation of high-caliber artists, and with the same care for the atmosphere and hospitality that characterize it. If we manage to maintain this balance, then I believe the festival can establish itself not only as a significant cultural institution, but also as a unique place for listening, gathering, and memory.
