Pianist Dana Ciocârlie, violinist Deborah Nemțanu and cellist Diana Ligeti will be performing at the Romanian Athenaeum on Wednesday, March 4^th, as part of the incredible Musique & Solidarité concert that starts at 7 PM and marks 30 years since the founding of the SERA Romania Foundation.

Your concert at the Romanian Athenaeum is called Musique & Solidarité, an event that supports children from Romania's isolated communities. What does the invitation to participate in this project mean for you?

First of all, it's a very important cause, not just for a mother, but also for an artist, and for all of humanity, to take care of children. It's also a national cause, because it's about my homeland. Second of all, for the first time, I'll enjoy the opportunity to perform together with two friends of mine, who I had performed with separately, but never with both: cellist Diana Ligeti and violinist Deborah Nemțanu. Third of all, we'll be performing a beautiful program that highlights the friendship between France and Romania. The program features Romanian and French composers equally.

As you've said before, you will perform together with violinist Deborah Nemțanu and cellist Diana Ligeti. How did this collaboration come to be and how is it shaping up?

Oana Drăgulinescu came up with the idea, and we're very thankful to her for it. She came up with the idea to invite all three of us. I've been performing with Diana for more than 30 years, we've known each other since we were students, her in Cluj, and me in Bucharest. I think we had tens of performances together, we even recorded together. Sarah Nemțanu and Deborah Nemțanu are concertmasters in the most important French orchestras. We discussed the program, which we then submitted to Oana Drăgulinescu.

The program is made up of the works of important French and Romanian composers - Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel, George Enescu, Ciprian Porumbescu and Paul Constantinescu. Does any piece in the program have a special meaning to you?

All things have a special meaning to me. I want to highlight the tight bond between Maurice Ravel and George Enescu. They were classmates in Gabriel Faure's music composition class at the Paris Conservatory. The piece that's closest to my soul is the piano transcription of the famous Ciocârlia, which I will perform solo.

You said in an interview that the Romanian Athenaeum is your favorite place. What exactly makes this space so special to you?

First of all, the Romanian Athenaeum is an unique architectural monument among the world's concert halls, through the way it was built, through that fresco. I've never seen another concert hall like this anywhere else, a hall evocative of the history of a nation, which opens the listeners' hearts to music and high spiritual spheres. On the other hand, it's an iconic place for any Romanian musician. If a Romanian musician is invited to perform at the Romanian Athenaeum, it's already one of their greatest achievements in life.

You also have an important teaching career in France. Are there any values that you wish to pass on to the future generations of musicians that you're teaching?

Yes, values I adopted from the Romanian piano education school. I studied Miss Florica Musicescu's tradition through my teachers, Florino de la Tola, Lucian Teodorescu and Ludmila Popișteanu, and I can say that my creed is the same as Dinu Lipatti's, a former student of Miss Musicescu: "Don't let yourself be served by music, but serve music."

What other projects do you have scheduled in the upcoming period, both in France and in Romania?

First of all, I'll be returning to Romania to perform a solo piano recital at the Romanian Athenaeum on May 12. The event is very important to me, because I'll be presenting a large portion of my solo CD, titled Ciocârlia, which was released a month ago with the French record label La Dolce Volta and which is, obviously, dedicated to Romanian music. Furthermore, this week I'll be recording Maurice Ravel's Piano Trio for piano, violin, and cello, part of which we'll be performing on the 4^th of March in Bucharest. I'll be performing an important recital at Salle Cotort, multiple recitals in Switzerland, in March, and a concert at the Saint-Louise de Invalides Cathedral, where Napoleon Bonaparte's tomb is. I'll be performing Camille Saint-Saëns's Piano Concerto No. 5 in F major, Op. 103, "The Egyptian".