From the 22nd to the 31st of May St. Petersburg will host ‘the parade of the winners” – the world-famous international Musical Olympus Festival. This year the program of the festival includes seven concerts of young outstanding musicians in the best halls of the city, as well as a special social concert program.

At the XVII Musical Olympus Festival more than 30 participants from 13 countries will represent Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Moldova, Germany, Poland, Spain, Switzerland, Greece, Mexico, Korea, Singapore and Japan.

The young musicians will perform together with such famous St. Petersburg orchestras as the Mariinsky Theatre Symphonic Orchestra, the St. Petersburg State Academic Capella Symphonic Orchestra, the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Academic Symphonic Orchestra and the State Hermitage Orchestra.

In the framework of the 2012 festival special attention will be paid to social and educational aspects. The ‘Musical Olympus’ foundation is planning to organize three concerts of young musicians: in a pre-trial detention centre, in a hospice for children and in a senior centre. ‘We want to bring joy to people whose life is a very hard one and who cannot possibly come to concerts themselves because of their physical condition. Good music gives people a sense of purification and an emotional impulse which is so important for all of us’, Irina Nikitina, president of ‘Musical Olympus’ foundation remarks.

The Festival will open at the Mariinsky Theatre Concert Hall with the anthem of this annual musical event – an overture by Andrey Petrov "Vivat, Olympus!" directed by a permanent participant of the Festival from Azerbaijan Ayub Kuliev (the first prize (G.Sinopoli Prize), International Contest named after A. Toscanini, Parma (Italy), 2010).

Among dozens of important festivals and concerts the Musical Olympus Festival that each spring turns Petersburg into the musical capital of the world is an absolutely unique event. The main goal of the festival is to support young musicians at the very beginning of their creative career, regardless of their nationality and music specialization, guiding by the only criterion of excellence and talent.

The winners of recent biggest international competitions are invited to participate in the festival. For 16 years of work the festival has shown to the audience more than 380 young performers from 40 countries of the world. Many of them have already become world-famous musicians, e.g. Nikolaj Znaider, Ilya Gringolts, Sayaka Shoji, Eldar Nebolsin, Martin Fröst, Marina Poplavskaya, Darrell Ang, Vasily Petrenko, Enrico Dindo, Anna Kasyan, Tugan Sokhiev, Khatia Buniatishvili and many others.

The festival concerts are traditionally held at the most beautiful halls of the northern capital: the Mariinsky Theatre Concert Hall, the Hermitage Theater, Grand Hall of D.D. Shostakovich St. Petersburg Academic Philharmonia and the St. Petersburg State Academic Capella.

Some participants of the St. Petersburg Festival get a unique opportunity to perform at presentation concerts of the festival taking place at Carnegie Hall in New York, the Berlin Philharmonic Hall, the Tonhalle in Zurich and the Esplanade in Singapore. The geographic representation at the festival is expanding every year. Starting from 2012 presentation concerts are planned to be held in France, Azerbaijan and Lebanon. Besides, one of the festival participants is awarded with the Audience Award – an Easter egg made by an artist-jeweler Vladimir Mikhailov.