Palace of Arts to celebrate birthday with gala concert, photo exhibition

By: MTI

2010-03-12 09:30

The Palace of Arts in Budapest will celebrate its 5th birthday with a gala concert and a photo exhibition on March 14, the director of the cultural centre told reporters on Thursday.

Celebrating the anniversary the Palace's orchestra, the Hungarian National Philharmonics, will perform works by Brahms, Kodaly and Bartok, conducted by the prominent Hungarian conductor Zoltan Kocsis, said Imre Kiss.

Kocsis, also a pianist, will play Franz Liszt's piano concerto in E-flat major as part of the programme, he said.

Kodaly's choral work "Pange Lingua" will be performed by the Hungarian National Choir led by Matyas Antal. The piece's organ solo will be recited by Laszlo Fassang.

An exhibition displaying the best of the 3,400 photos submitted in a contest for the anniversary will open in the Palace's main hall. The winners of the contest will receive awards going with 100,000 forints (EUR 372) as first prize.

As many as 3.5 million guests attended programmes in the Palace of Arts and the Ludwig Museum of Contemporary Art it holds over the past five years with every ten of them coming from abroad.