The Vilnius University Chamber Orchestra is a chamber music ensemble striving for high artistic quality and, for five decades now, bringing together performers with diverse musical backgrounds. The orchestra’s artistic director and conductor is Modestas Jankūnas, under whose leadership the ensemble continuously refines its artistic mastery, expands its repertoire, pursues professionalism, actively implements creative initiatives, and participates in academic and cultural life.
The Vilnius University Chamber Orchestra is a chamber music ensemble striving for high artistic quality and, for five decades now, bringing together performers with diverse musical backgrounds. The orchestra’s artistic director and conductor is Modestas Jankūnas, under whose leadership the ensemble continuously refines its artistic mastery, expands its repertoire, pursues professionalism, actively implements creative initiatives, and participates in academic and cultural life.
The orchestra was founded in 1979 by pedagogue and flutist Paulius Bernardas Koncė, who led it until 2019. Established initially as a quartet, the ensemble grew into a chamber orchestra that became an organic part of Vilnius University’s cultural life and has honorably represented the musical potential of Lithuania’s academic community on an international level. Over the many years of its creative activity, the orchestra has become an important part of Lithuania’s musical life, actively performing in major concert halls and churches throughout the country.
One of the most important directions of the orchestra’s activity is international academic cooperation. By strengthening cultural dialogue between institutions of higher education, the ensemble carries out musical projects together with orchestras from some of Europe’s most renowned universities. Over the past decade, the musicians have performed in sacred and concert venues renowned for their exceptional acoustics in Paris, Vienna, Padua, Bologna, Rome, The Hague, Prague, Riga, and other cities. Throughout its history, the orchestra has toured not only Europe, but also countries in North and South America and Asia.
The range of the orchestra’s concert programs is truly broad. Its repertoire includes works from various eras and styles – Baroque, Galant, Classical, Romantic, Modernist, and contemporary music – as well as compositions by composers from many different countries. The orchestra frequently accompanies well-known Lithuanian and international soloists and has had the opportunity to perform under the baton of not only prominent Lithuanian conductors (Prof. Saulius Sondeckis, Modestas Pitrėnas, Modestas Barkauskas), but also the Baroque music specialist Rodrigo Calveyra (Brazil), the conductor of the Granada Youth Symphony Orchestra Gabriel Delgado (Spain), and the conductor of the Sorbonne University Symphony Orchestra Nicolas Agullo (Argentina). To document the orchestra’s artistic development, four recordings have been released, and a number of rarely performed works have been recorded for the archives of Lithuanian Radio. Each year, the ensemble also takes part in the “Culture Night” events, offering audiences late-night music programs titled Musica notturna.
A significant achievement for the orchestra was its participation in an international orchestra festival in Vienna in 2017, where it was awarded the Gold Prize and a special Honorary Diploma by the festival jury, and where it performed five preludes by M. K. Čiurlionis in the Golden Hall of the Vienna Musikverein, renowned for its outstanding acoustics.
The orchestra is part of the Vilnius University Cultural Center and consistently collaborates with other ensembles belonging to the Center. Joint projects with Vilnius University academic choirs are frequent, especially in performances of large-scale works (W. A. Mozart’s Requiem, Ola Gjeilo’s Sunrise Mass, Gabriel Fauré’s Requiem, Martín Palmeri’s Misa a Buenos Aires, and others). Since 2021, on the initiative of orchestra director M. Jankūnas, the concert “Generations” (Kartos) has been organized, bringing together not only current members of the orchestra but also alumni. As the ensemble was founded in the same year that Vilnius University celebrated its 400th anniversary, the tradition of the Generations concert – each time uniting the university orchestra community – allows audiences not only to celebrate the orchestra’s own history and growth, but also to festively mark the birthday of Vilnius University.
