Russian Music 2.0

Five world premieres for large ensemble and electronics conducted by Fyodor Lednev.

Programme

Leonid Zvolinsky (b. 1986)
Mi(e)rrors, 2025 (world premiere)

Sergei Leonov (b. 1994)
Ultra, 2025 (world premiere)

Lizaveta Loban (b. 1997)
Trén pa blednému soramu (“Train on Pale Shame”), 2025 (world premiere)

Nikolai Khrust (b. 1982)
Concerto grosso, 2025 (world premiere)

Artem Tsios (b. 1999)
Underground Songs, 2025 (world premiere)

The Russian Music 2.0 programme, held annually since 2020, was conceived by the Aksenov Family Foundation as an opportunity for different cultures and artistic schools to meet, and for musicians and listeners from different generations and aesthetic traditions to interact. The programme brings together composers from Russia and beyond who engage in dialogue with the post-Soviet music context, revise its premises, and define new agendas and directions for exploration. Moscow venues for Russian Music 2.0 in past years have included the Vsevolod Meyerhold Centre, the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall, and Garage Museum of Contemporary Art. In 2025, the programme comes to the Playhouse at GES-2 House of Culture, under the baton of conductor Fyodor Lednev.

Performed by

Fyodor Lednev conductor

Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble | MCME

Yaroslav Timofeev concert host

Illustration: Anastasia Filippova

The new works to be performed this year, by five composers from Russia, Belarus, France, Switzerland, and Japan, are all situated at the intersection of sound, performance, and media innovation. Artem Tsios, a native of Brest (Belarus), is a fourth-year student at the Moscow Conservatory. Nikolai Khrust, a graduate of the Moscow Conservatory, lives in France, where he studies the nature of sound in its physical and metaphysical dimensions. Lizaveta Loban, whose works are regularly performed in Russia, teaches composition at Maladzechna Music College (Belarus) and explores contemporary interpretations of Belarusian folklore. Sergei Leonov, heir to the Saint Petersburg school of composition, lives in Geneva and combines electroacoustic and instrumental music, experimental pop, and interdisciplinary performance in his work. Another graduate of the Moscow Conservatory, Leonid Zvolinsky, based in Japan since 2017, explores human perception of sound.

Leonid Zvolinsky (b. 1986, Ryazan) is a composer and media artist. He studied at the Moscow Conservatory and is currently a postgraduate student at the Music Department of Tokyo University of the Arts. His principal works in recent years include the interactive audiovisual installations Forest of Prayer (2025, Kyoto), Sleeping Memory (2025, Saitama), Sound Tree (2024, Tokyo), Noise of Memory (2024, Tokyo), musical compositions and performances for instruments and electronics Where Is Your Warmth? (2025, Kyoto), Whisperscapes (2023, Tokyo), and Matataki (2023, Tokyo). Leonid Zvolinsky is based in Kyoto (Japan), and is contributing to the research project Hearing X at the laboratory of Japan’s largest telecommunications company, NTT.

Sergei Leonov (b. 1994, Saint Petersburg) is a composer and audiovisual artist. He is a graduate of the Saint Petersburg Conservatory and the Geneva University of Music. He collaborates with a number of music ensembles (Vortex, HYPER DUO, PlayTime, and mise-en). He has worked at the Geneva School of Art and Design since 2024 and in 2025 he co-founded the LECZ association, which is dedicated to experimental and interdisciplinary art. Current and forthcoming projects include an audiovisual performance for the Electron festival, a new composition for the KorSonoR festival, and a collaborative residency in Venice with sound researcher Nina Baietta. In 2024–2025, Sergei Leonov is a resident at the L’Abri international study centre in Geneva, where he is developing interdisciplinary projects and preparing new productions for the Fête de la Musique and Museum Nights festivals. He lives in Geneva.

Lizaveta Loban (b. 1997, Minsk) is a composer. She graduated from the Belarusian Academy of Music where she studied with Galina Gorelova and Oleg Khodosko, and completed postgraduate studies at the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet in Saint Petersburg. She teaches at the Maladzechna Music College in Belarus. She has worked with the MolOt ensemble, the Ensemble of Independent Musicians, the Festino Chamber Choir (Saint Petersburg), the Altro Coro Ensemble (Moscow), the Schallfeld Ensemble (Graz), the Arcis Saxophon Quartett (Munich), and the Neue Vocalsolisten (Stuttgart). She has been involved in various interdisciplinary and theatrical projects: Diana Vishneva’s Context Festival of Contemporary Choreography, the Diaghilev Festival (Perm), the Glyptic Dance Company (Novosibirsk), and the Belarusian State Music Theatre. She lives in Maladzechna.

Artem Tsios (born 1999, Brest) is a composer. He studied at the Belarusian Academy of Music with Galina Gorelova and is currently studying at the Moscow Conservatory with Alexander Tchaikovsky. He completed internships at the International Music Academy of the Winter International Arts Festival in Sochi (2022–2024), the International Academy of Young Composers in the town of Tchaikovsky in Perm Region (2025), and the New Sounds of the Future workshop in Stuttgart (2025). He took first prize in the eighth Alfred Schnittke and Sviatoslav Richter Competition for Young Composers (Sochi, 2022). He has also taken part in the Escapades festival (Brussels, 2022), a project by Boris Yukhananov and the “Kafka in Athens” Individual Directing Workshop (2025). Artem Tsios lives in Moscow.

Nikolai Khrust (1982, Moscow) is a composer, sound artist, audio designer, teacher, and doctoral candidate in art history. He studied as an undergraduate at the Moscow Conservatory before continuing to a postgraduate programme with Vladimir Tarnopolsky. He has also taught at the Moscow Conservatory. Nikolai Khrust has taken part in festivals in Moscow, Paris, Berlin, Darmstadt (Summer Courses), Venice (Biennale), Zagreb (ISCM World Music Days) and elsewhere. He has completed residencies at the Meyerhold Centre (Moscow), the GRAME Centre de création musicale, Electroacoustic Centre (Lyon), and CIRM (Nice). He specialises in the creation of sound programmes and forms of contemporary notation. A project by Nikolai Khrust was presented in 2025 at the Paris Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music (IRCAM). He won an award as part of the Moscow Art Prize (2021). Nikolai Khrust lives in Saint-Chamond (France).

Fyodor Lednev (b. 1971, Minsk) is a conductor. He graduated from the Saint Petersburg Conservatory specialising in choral conducting (1995) and operatic and symphonic conducting (1998). Since 1995, he has taught at the Saint Petersburg Rimsky-Korsakov Music College. He has appeared as guest conductor with leading Russian orchestras, including the Svetlanov State Orchestra, the Russian National Orchestra, the Russian National Youth Symphony Orchestra, the musicAeterna Choir and Orchestra, and others. In 2024 he won the prize for Best Conducting Work at the Golden Mask theatre awards in Moscow.

Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble (MCME) was founded in 1990 by composer Yuri Kasparov assisted by Russian avant-garde luminary Edison Denisov. MCME was the first Russian ensemble to focus on music of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and on cooperation with contemporary composers. MCME has given Russian and world premieres of more than 1000 works.