Pianist Horia Mihail has started his journey in the 8^th edition of the "Traveling Piano" tour, organized by the Accendo Cultural Association, The Culture Hub and Pro Contemporania, in co-production with Radio România Cultural, Radio România Muzical and Radio România Regional.

You begin your eighth adventure with the "Traveling Piano" right in the second day of Easter. Since this year we are celebrating 100 years from the Great Union, what will your repertoire look like?

It will be a combination between the strong feats of all the previous editions and the performance of a new song, as well. We have chosen well-known classical music works, such as Mozart's Alla Turca, Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, Schumann's Träumerei, to which I have added Enescu's Rhapsody, performing the version for piano, as the composer intended it. This will be a premiere that will take place on Monday, on the second day of Easter, in Arad. Well, premiere from my point of view, because the song has been played by many other pianists.

Where will your piano travel to this year?

We have an interesting itinerary. There will be 18 concerts, out of which two will be in Bucharest. I will travel, as usual, in the three main regions in Romania - in Moldavia, Wallachia and Transylvania. I could enlist all the cities because I have checked my schedule and I know how much I have to drive, how much sleep I'll get, how much time I have to study during this next month. In any case, as opposed to other editions, this year, in the eighth edition of this tour, I will be visiting new cities.

What are your thoughts while starting your eighth journey?

It is the eighth journey. Let's call it an anniversary journey. Why, you ask? Because this edition coincides with an event that is very important for Romania, and I am talking, of course, about the 100 year celebration since probably the most important event in our history. And I thought that when you celebrate something, apart from the moments of joy and euphoria, there comes a moment of contemplation, where you think about what went right and what went wrong in the event that you are now celebrating, a moment where you try to gather all your strength and look towards the future. Personally, this is my manner of thinking about the anniversary of all Romanians. And we also have this "mini-anniversary" of the "Traveling Piano".