Andrea Paiss organized a serenade concert by the BFO for the 93rd birthday of her music-loving grandmother. Remember that we had some wonderful moments even at the time of the pandemic.

Magda Gárdonyi, the grandmother, had been present with her husband at the very first concert of the Festival Orchestra in 1983.

During the pandemic, the Festival Orchestra came up with the idea of the Serenade Concerts: small chamber ensembles performed to residents of usually old buildings with an interior courtyard and hanging corridors in Budapest. Andrea wrote to the orchestra that her grandmother would have her birthday in early July and that she could be surprised in her home in central Budapest. When Granny Magda stepped out to the corridor, the musician were already there in the courtyard: “There is someone here who has a birthday coming up soon”, they said. “This concert is performed particularly for her.”

You can read the whole storyhere. You can watch our film about the Serenade Concerts during the pandemic here.