A Renaissance music tour across twelve locations in Romania

From 17 to 28 September, as part of the Iter Musicum Europae – Romanian Tour 2026, five early-music specialists from Romania and Hungary will perform in twelve locations and historic venues across Romania. The programme features European music from the 16th and 17th centuries, played on period instruments including lute, viola da gamba, recorder, virginal and harpsichord. Period costumes are also an integral part of the project. The tour is organised by the Asociația Festivalul Baroc Timișoara. The ensemble brings together soprano Eszter Gyüdi, recorder player Emese Szilágyi, Alina Rotaru on virginal and harpsichord, viol player Arthur Balogh and lutenist Caius Hera, who also serves as musical director.

One of the distinctive features of the tour is the virginal, a plucked-string keyboard instrument belonging to the harpsichord family. Caius Hera reconstructed it in his Timișoara workshop after a model made in Amsterdam in 1605. Its decoration is the work of artist Remus Rotaru, who teaches at the Faculty of Arts and Design at the West University of Timișoara. Rarely heard in Romania today, the instrument will be played throughout the tour.

Concerts will take place at venues including the fortified church of Biertan, Făgăraș Citadel, the Brukenthal Museum of Contemporary Art in Sibiu, Corvin Castle in Hunedoara and the Maria Radna Basilica. The tour will conclude on 28 September at 7 pm at the Roman Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in Timișoara’s Elisabetin district.

According to Caius Hera, president of the Asociația Festivalul Baroc Timișoara and project coordinator, Iter Musicum Europae aims to bring Renaissance music closer to contemporary audiences while recreating a living connection between Europe’s musical heritage and the places that preserve its memory.

Beyond the concerts, the project combines historically informed performance, musicological research and cultural outreach. A short encyclopaedia devoted to Renaissance music and a CD have also been produced and will be made available to the public during the tour. The cultural project is co-funded by Romania’s Administration of the National Cultural Fund (AFCN).