Viennese student and scholar of the “Herbert von Karajan Foundation”, Tomislav Mužek today regularly performs at music stages around the world. A frequent quest at La Scala, he performed at the opera stages of Paris, Firenze, Geneva, Salzburg, London, Tokyo and many others, and had an exceptional honor to perform at the Wagner Festival in Bayreuth. Wolfgang Wagner, grandson of the great Richard Wagner and director of the festival in Bayreuth, said they haven’t had such a helmsman in the Flying Dutchman ever.

At the Evening of Lied in the Rector’s Palace, Mužek performed love and folk songs. Solo songs of Johannes Brahms and Richard Strauss are themes of love, of exceptional lyricism and brimming with emotions. Both composers are distinctive authors of the “Lied” and although less known to wider audience, Lied represents significant part of their creative opus. Vladimir Ruždjak, although known to the public as a renowned Croatian baritone, left behind an exceptional composer’s opus which leans on the folklore musical sources. The series of folk songs from Međimurje, which the Dubrovnik’s audience has heared, is thought of as the pinnacle of his creativity. These songs, as critics agree, are adorned with the high quality and a refined approach combined with the beauty of expression.

There is no doubt that the “Nightingale from Ludbreg”, as Mužek is often referred to, successfully interpreted these songs in the Rector’s Palace, and that he, at the end, woke the romantic fervor in every person in the audience.