Founded in 2006 by the violist Razvan Popovici, in only four years the SoNoRo Festival developed into one of the most exciting and innovative music festivals in Eastern Europe.
Bucharest, the capital city of Romania, is the home of the festival. The concerts take place in renowned concert halls as well as in clubs, museums and other unusual locations, underlining the creative and adventurous spirit of this young cultural innitiative.
Another very important part of the SoNoRo project is SoNoRo-INTERFERENCES, a programme dedicated to the most talented young Romanian musicians. Every year around thirty scholarships are awarded.
The SoNoRo Festival regularly goes on tour, performing not only in other major Romanian cities like Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu, Timisoara, Craiova, Bistrita and Iasi but also in some of the most famous concert halls worldwide like Carnegie Hall in New York, Wigmore Hall in London and Konzerthaus in Vienna.
Wishing to include actively Bucharest in the international musical network, the SoNoRo Festival colaborates regularly with festivals abroad, including Riga Kammermusiktage (LV), Chiemgauer Musikfrühling in Traunstein and Pèlerinages in Munich (D), Music at Plush (UK), Sounding Jerusalem (IL), Tartini Festival (SLO) and Kobe Music Festival (JP).
At the SoNoRo, Ensemble Raro, the ensemble in residence of the Festival, performs next to some of the most appreciated and loved musicians from all over the world, such as Konstantin Lifschitz, Daishin Kashimoto, Mark Padmore, Mihaela Ursuleasa, Gilles Apap, Reto Bieri, Alexander Chaushian, Carolin Widmann, Priya Mitchell, Marcelo Nisinman, Corinne Chapelle and Adrian Brendel.
So far the festival released two higly acclaimed CD's – Songs and Dances of Life and The Seasons and the photography album SONORO – Imagining Music by Serban Mestecaneanu. We also created two limited sorts of the very special SoNoRo wine - SONORO Cantabile and SONORO Vivace.
