08/09/2026 - 02/10/2026 ore: 21:00 - 23:00
Piazza Duomo, Pisa
The “Anima Mundi” Festival is an international festival of sacred music, organised by the Opera della Primaziale Pisana, which has been held for 25 years in the Cathedral and the Monumental Cemetery. Concerts take place from 8 September to 2 October (at 9.00 pm). This year’s edition revolves around the central theme of peace, through masterpieces of the sacred tradition that evoke the universal desire for reconciliation and hope amongst peoples.
The festival features seven concerts: four major symphonic-choral events in the Cathedral and three evenings in the Camposanto, with a programme that bridges the past and the present.
Tuesday 8 September in the Cathedral: the customary welcome from the brass section high up in the Tower, followed by a grand return: Sir John Eliot Gardiner, artistic director of Anima Mundi, leading the ensembles he founded and conducts, The Constellation Choir & Orchestra, with the participation of sopranos Hilary Cronin and Samantha Cobb and tenor Jonathan Hanley, will perform two cornerstones of nineteenth-century German spirituality: Johannes Brahms’s ‘Song of Destiny’ and Felix Mendelssohn’s ‘Song of Praise’.
Monday 14 September in the Camposanto: Lucas Debargue, a French pianist, will perform Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Second Sonata and his own arrangement, entitled ‘Variations and Finale’, based on ‘Summertime’, the most famous of the songs written by George Gershwin
Thursday 17 September in the Cathedral: Franco Battiato’s *Messa Arcaica*, performed by Simone Cristicchi and Amara, alongside mezzo-soprano Mara Gaudenzi, with Guido Corti conducting the Canova Orchestra and the Turin Chamber Choir. The programme will be rounded off by Battiato’s *Canzoni Mistiche*.
On Monday 21 September in the Camposanto, the winner of the 18th International Sacred Composition Competition, Pietro Dinetto – a composer and pianist who has devoted a significant part of his output to sacred music and the spiritual dimension of sound – will perform his *Cantico* to open the concert with the Orchestra Cremona Antiqua, conducted by Antonio Greco.
On Thursday 24 September in the Cathedral, Joseph Haydn’s *The Creation* will be conducted by James Conlon, who has long been at the helm of the Paris Opera and the Los Angeles Opera, as well as orchestras such as the Rotterdam Philharmonic and the RAI National Orchestra: joining him will be renowned soloists, including soprano Sydney Mancasola, tenor Daniel Behle, Markus Werba (bass), and some of Tuscany’s finest ensembles, including the ‘Guido Chigi Saracini’ Siena Cathedral Choir, conducted by Lorenzo Donati, and the Orchestra della Toscana, of which Conlon is honorary conductor.
On Tuesday 29 September in the Camposanto, the Estonian National Male Choir, conducted by Mikk Üleoja, will perform alongside the distinguished Italian organist Marco Arlotti. The programme features works by Estonian composers: Arvo Pärt, the greatest among them and one of the most frequently performed living composers in the world; two other contemporaries, Riho Esko Maimets and Tõnis Kaumann; and Rudolf Tobias, the father of Estonian music.
On Friday 2 October, the Cathedral will host a grand finale featuring Anima Mundi’s artistic director, Trevor Pinnock, who will perform Brahms’s German Requiem – based on biblical texts – alongside outstanding soloists such as soprano Regula Mühlemann and bass Krešimir Stražanac, and some of Germany’s most renowned radio ensembles: the Norddeutscher Rundfunk Radiophilharmonie Orchestra from Hanover and two combined choirs, the Norddeutscher Rundfunk Vokalensemble from Hamburg and the Westdeutscher Rundfunkchor from Cologne.