Presented for the first time in 2010, with the artistic direction of Diemut Poppen and under the initiative of Goethe Institute, Festival Cantabile occurs yearly, during the month of September in the city of Lisbon, and is one of the most important festivals of chamber music in the country.

Festival Cantabile, "The art of Chamber Music", offers a variety of classical and modern repertoires to the Portuguese people, in particular habitants of the Lisbon region, connecting periods of time and crossing pieces of classical masters with contemporary composers such as Rihm, Ligeti, Kurtag, Kancheli and the portuguese Antonio Pinho Vargas and Luís Tinoco.

 

The presence of internationally renowned artists such as: Diemut Poppen, Alexander Lonquich, H.Schuch, Gerhild Romberger, Reinhold Friedrich, Alexander Chaushian, Pavel Gomziakov, Paolo Giacometti, Isabelle Faust or Christel Lee, the participation of the best portuguese soloists Maria João Pires and Paulo Gaio Lima, the collaboration with great institutions and national orchestras such as the Gulbenkian Orchestra and the Portuguese Symphony Orchestra, demonstrate the recognition of quality and interest of Festival Cantabile by the institutions and is confirmed by aproximately 14000 people which have attended the concerts.

Performing in spaces such as Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Teatro Nacional de São Carlos, Centro Cultural de Belém, and Palácios Nacionais de Sintra, Queluz e Mafra, or the use of nonconventional spaces like the Ruins of Carmo, the Academy of Sciences of Lisbon and the Museum of money.

 

The dynamic and spirit of the Festival has seen more than 50 concerts in Portugal in 15 different stages and is regularly partnering with new institutions. Festival Cantabile also commissioned a new Viola concerto of A.P.Vargas and Diemut Poppen performed the World Premiere with Gulbenkian orquestra and  over the years the soloists of Festival Cantabile gave numerous masterclasses.

 

With a clear and increasingly important preocupation for Social character, Festival Cantabile seeks to collaborate with pedagogical projects of social inclusion through music, achieving, through this, its essence and effort. For example, in 2017, through the Goethe Institute and the German embassy in Lisbon, the Festival Cantabile  were able to offer 37 musical instruments to Orchestra Geração.