Azerbaijan to join TURKSOY Opera Days
By Victoria Moiseyeva
The Opera Days festival is traditionally held by TURKSOY every year. TURKSOY has carried out many national and international projects since its establishment to maintain cultural cooperation between Turkic peoples. This year, Opera Days will take place from September 15 to 30.
The participating countries are Azerbaijan, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and etc.
This year's Opera Days, which will be held with the contribution of 15 artists from TURKSOY member countries, will be dedicated to the commemoration of the legendary Turkish opera singer Leyla Genjer.
The Opera Days of TURKSOY will start with a concert at the Opera and Cultural Center of Istanbul named after Leyla Genjer where the soloists will be accompanied by the Orchestra of the Istanbul State Opera and Ballet of the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism. Following the opening concert, artists will perform several concerts in Bursa, Ayvalik, Bodrum, Marmaris and Odemis.
Within the framework of their tour in Turkey, the opera stars will then give two concerts in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.
The Opera Days of TURKSOY which were held for the first time in 1994 have been organized every year. It has become a traditional event gathering famous artists from the Turkic World as a unique opportunity of artistic and cultural exchange. This international event has been held in many different cities and countries so far.
The life of the organization dates back to the 1992 meetings in Baku and Istanbul, where the ministers of culture from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkey, and Turkmenistan declared their commitment to cooperate in a joint cultural framework. TURKSOY was subsequently established by an agreement signed on July 12, 1993 in Almaty, Kazakhstan.