It will be the first time Vietnamese musicians have been invited to take part in the festival held in Beethoven’s native city of Bonn . Attending will be top international orchestras, well-known soloists, major ensembles and promising young performers.

Two shows by Vietnamese musicians will be held on September 27 and 30 at the Beethovenhall.

On Sept. 27, the musicians will perform Beethoven’s Coriolanus overture and Symphony No 7, as well as Rhapsody of Vietnam by Do Hong Quan and Tran Manh Hung’s Le Chi Vien for orchestra and violin under the baton of French conductor Claire Levacher.

The second show will feature classical pieces by Beethoven and Max Bruch and R Schumann. The highlight of the show will be a solo violin performance by Bui Cong Duy conducted by Germany ’s Peter Gulker.

Duy, 28, is considered the most talented violin artist in Vietnam . He won many international awards, including first prize at the Tchaikovsky International Music Contest in 1997; first prize at the Demidov International Music Contest in Ekaterinburg , Russia , in 1993 and simultaneously the award for the best performance of J S Bach, for which he was given the title “Asian Pride”.

He has performed in many major music events such as the Saint Petersburg , 1997; the Gala Concert in Bolshoi, Moscow , in 2003, and the Asian Week Festival in Tokyo and Osaka .

He has also performed with famous chamber orchestras such as the Novosibirsk Philharmonic orchestra, the St-Peterburg Phiharmonic Kapella orchestra, the Moscow Philharmonic orchestra and the London Festival orchestra in many countries such as Italy, Japan, Germany, Poland, England, Russia and France.

Currently, he teaches at the Vietnam National Academy of Music.

After the shows, the musicians will take part in a workshop on Romanticism with a youth orchestra, which has become a tradition at the Beethovenfest Bonn.

Beethoven festivals in Bonn date back to 1845, when a three-day music event was held to mark the erection of the Beethoven Monument on the Munsterplatz on the occasion of the 75 th anniversary of the composer’s birth. The Beethovenfest Bonn has existed in its modern form, namely an annual four-week autumn festival since 1999.

The Vietnamese musicians will also perform in Berlin on October 1./.