This year’s Rosendal Chamber Music Festival, which was scheduled to take place from 6 – 9 August, has become the latest casualty in the ever-increasing list of cancellations this summer, due to the current pandemic and government limitations on gatherings.

The Norwegian Festival, which had already sold out, will contact ticket purchasers to inform them of their reimbursement options and compensate all the artists with 20% of their fees. This year’s guest artists will also be re-invited to perform at the 2022 Rosendal Festival, when the same programme dedicated to Beethoven, will be re-scheduled as closely as possible to the original plan. The two-year delay is due to planning for the 2021 festival which is well underway and for which other artists have already been invited – engagements which the festival feels are equally important to honour.

The final concert of this year’s four day event was scheduled to include a world premiere performance by Norwegian composer / saxophonist Marius Neset. As delaying a composer’s new work by two years feels particularly sad, the Rosendal Festival’s Founder and Director, Leif Ove Andsnes, has proposed that the new work be retained as the centre point to a single programme which will also feature Beethoven, in small recognition of the composer’s 250th anniversary. The closed concert performed by Norwegian artists including both Andsnes and Neset, will be filmed and broadcast on the Festival’s social media channels as a gift to Rosendal audiences. Details of the full programme, artists and broadcast date to follow.

Leif Ove Andsnes commented “I am deeply saddened that we will not be able to come together this summer for what was going to be a special few days immersed in Beethoven. These are difficult times for freelance artists and I am relieved that we are able to compensate this year’s guest musicians in some way and to re-invite them to Rosendal, two years hence. I am also glad that we are able to find a solution in order that the stage at Rosendal will not be completely silent this summer and, more importantly, that the world premiere of Marius Neset’s new work will still take place, be it under altered circumstances.”

The Rosendal Chamber Music Festival extends deep thanks to the Kristian Gerhard Jebsen Foundation, whose meaningful financial support has made the festival’s ambitious artistic goals attainable since its inauguration in 2016 and maintained its support during these difficult times.