CONCERT by Giorgio Mandolesi, bassoon and Nataša Šarčević, piano held at IIC Belgrade

Italian Institute for Culture

Kneza Miloša 56, 23 April 2015 at 19:30h

In cooperation with the Italian Institute for Culture, Belgrade, ArtLink organised an evening concert by Giorgio Mandolesi, bassoon and Nataša Šarčević, piano.

This concert marked the 70th anniversary since the liberation of Italy and the reopening of the Italian Institute’s concert hall. The concert, held before 150 visitors, was a part of ArtLink’s European Music Cycle.

Giorgio Mandolesi is the principal solo bassoonist of the famous “Orchestre de Paris” and professor at the Paris (CNSMDP) and Zurich (ZHdK) Conservatoires.

He graduated from the “Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia” in Rome in 1991 obtaining the Premier Prix in the class of Professor Marco Costantini, and later on studied baroque and classical bassoon with Professor Alberto Grazzi in Milan, obtaining the Premier Prix in 1999. He also studied with Milan Turkovic in Florence and Daniele Damiano, Principal bassoon with the Berlin Philharmonic at the Accademia Chigiana in Sienna. At an early age, he became Principal bassoon with the Italian Youth Orchestra, the Youth Orchestra of the European Community, the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra. Later on, he held posts of Principal bassoon at the leading Italian Orchestras, such as the Teatro la Fenice in Venice, Teatro P.L. Palestrina in Cagliari, Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa (1995 – 2002). In 2003 he moved to France taking on the post of Principal bassoon “Supersoliste” at the prestigious “Orchestre de Paris”.

He is also very interested in historic instruments and baroque music, and performs extensively with a great number of ensembles for period music, such as Il Giardino Armonico and Cecilia Bartoli, La Petite Bande de Sigiswald Kuikjen, Europa Galante de Fabio Biondi, La Grande Ecurie, La Chambre de Roi de Jean – Claude Malgloire, Balthasar Neumann, Ensemble de Thomas Hengelbrock, L’Orchestre de Nations de Jordi Savall, Concerto Italiano de Rinaldo Alessandrini, amongst others. He is also a member of two Windoctets, the Ensemble Philidor and Ensemble Zefiro, and regularly collaborates with musicians such as Alfredo Bernardini and Paolo and Alberto Grazzi. 

He has recently become a permanent member of the famous French wind instrument quintet “Moragues”. London audiences had the opportunity to hear him at the London Proms 2006 playing chamber music with pianist and conductor Christoph Eschenbach. Recent highlights include the performance of the Mozart Bassoon Concerto as soloist with the Orchestre de Paris at the “Salle Pleyel” in March 2014.

He held teaching posts in Spain at the Jove Orchestra de Catalunya (Barcelona) and the Escola Superior de Musica de Catalunya, and was Professor of baroque and classical bassoon and chamber music at the Scuola di Alto Perfezionamento Musicale in Saluzzo, Italy. He is currently holding the Professorship for baroque and modern bassoon at the ZHdK – Zurcher Hochschule der Kunst, Switzerland (since 2001) and is also teaching at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique et Danse de Paris (CNSMDP, since 2003). He is regularly invited to give masterclasses in Japan, China, Italy, Portugal, Spain, France, Latvia the USA, and since 2013 as visiting Professor at the Royal College of Music in London.

He recorded for Virgin Records (Concerto “Tempesta di mare” by Antonio Vivaldi for flute, oboe and bassoon with Europa Galante), Calliope, Stradivarius and Bongiovanni, as well as the Italian and French National Radio and Radio Vatican.

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Nataša Šarčević teaches at the London College of Music, University of West London. She studied at the renowned Specialist Music School “Stevan Mokranjac” and the University of Arts in Belgrade (FMU), the Hochschule fur Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Frankfurt and at the Royal College of Music in London, with professors Olga Jovanovic, Jokut Mihailovic, Lev Natochenny, Irina Zaritskaya, as well as working in masterclasses with Peter Katin, Dmitry Bashkirov, Bella Davidovich, Sergio Perticaroli and Cristina Ortiz, amongst others. Since the age of 12, she started winning numerous prizes in national competitions. At the age of 17 her recital in Belgrade, at the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences (Gallery SANU) was selected as one of the top ten concerts of the season by the critics of the prestigious NIN Magazine. A few months later she won first prizes in two international competitions in Italy within one week of each other, “Citta di Stresa” and “Carlo Soliva”, which resulted in an invitation for a concert tour. She also won the LCM “Beethoven Prize” and the”Victor Hoddy Prize” in London, respectively, the “Petar Konjovic Prize” and in her final year as a student the “Olga Mihailovic Prize” awarded by the Faculty of Music of the University of Arts in Belgrade as “the most talented student of her generation”. Natasa has since performed in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Austria, Holland, Serbia, Slovenia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Latvia, Russia and Brazil, as well as in the leading venues in the UK, such as the Wigmore Hall, St. John’s Smith Square, St. Martin’s in the Fields, Birmingham Fine Art Museum, at the Paxton House Festival, Edinburgh Festival Fringe and the London Arts Festival, to mention some. She also performed for the “Park Lane Group Monday Platform” at the Wigmore Hall, and gave concerts for the “Beethoven Society of Europe” and for EPTA UK, amongst others.

As a soloist she performed with the leading Serbian symphony orchestras: the Belgrade Philharmonic (Liszt and Tchaikovsky concertos), the Symphony Orchestra of the Serbian Radio and Television (Chopin Concerto no. 2, transmitted live on Radio Belgrade 1 on her 20th birthday). Her recitals have been recorded and transmitted on Slovenian, Serbian and Latvian Radio and TV.

Between 1994 – 1998 she held the post of Assistant Professor of Piano at the University of Arts in Belgrade. Since 2003 she has been associated with the London College of Music, the University of West London as an accompanist to the Strings Department, Chamber Music and Vocal Coach, and where she, since 2006 holds the post of Academic Lecturer of Piano, teaching students on BMus, MMus and Postgraduate Diploma in Piano Performance courses. She held master classes in Serbia, Slovenia, Latvia and over the last five years at the North London Piano School Summer Courses held at the Purcell School of Music. For the last three years, she worked with the “Mozart International Masterclasses” in Narni, Italy, which are held every August.  She served as a jury member at the London International Music Competition as well as the Mozart Association sede di Terni Competition in Italy. She is also an artistic adviser to the London Arts Fest.