Kazan hosts grand concert marking Raimonds Pauls' 90th birthday, featuring Russian pop stars

On August 24, Kazan's "New Wave Hall" hosted a grand concert dedicated to the 90th anniversary of composer Raimonds Pauls. The event took place as part of the international "New Wave" festival, a competition once closely linked to Jurmala and to Pauls himself.

The evening featured Pauls' melodies written across several decades that remain popular today. They were performed by a wide array of Russian pop stars, including Valery Leontiev, Philipp Kirkorov, Igor Krutoy, Leonid Agutin, Angelika Varum, Vladimir Presnyakov, Dima Bilan, Lolita and several other artists, along with the choir of Igor Krutoy's academy. The evening was hosted by Russian TV personality Lera Kudryavtseva together with singer Soso Pavliashvili.

The Maestro celebrated his 90th birthday on January 12 of this year, and the Kazan concert was dedicated to that milestone. A recording of the concert is scheduled to air on Russian TV channel "Rossiya 1" on August 29.

The festival's history with Latvia

Raimonds Pauls, together with Russian composer Igor Krutoy, was one of the founders of "New Wave," and from 2002 to 2014 the competition was held at the Dzintari concert hall in Jurmala. The festival left Latvia following a political conflict in 2014, when then-Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics, in connection with Russia's aggression against Ukraine, banned several Russian artists closely tied to the festival from entering Latvia. Festival organizer Igor Krutoy viewed this as a political blow to the event and decided to no longer hold it in Jurmala. After leaving Jurmala, "New Wave" was held in Sochi, and it is currently based in Kazan.