PRESS RELEASE (kind of)
Dear Papa,
I am honoured and am rushing to tell you that on March 23, 2022 Looking at the Stars Paramos Fondas (lookingatthestars.lt) was registered in your native Jonava ! – your love, your hometown and the source of your remarkable literature.
You probably remember our numerous conversations back in 2015, when I was establishing the foundation in Canada – it was this unique fantastic universe of hope of a little orphan created by you in the novelette “I look at the Stars“, published in 1959, which has inspired me with the very idea and the name of then a new Canadian charitable foundation. Today these conversations and the story of a little orphan continue to reinforce my faith in the human mission, planted in me by you and mama over many years we spent together and many more we spent apart.
Letting you know, that we (Looking at the Stars Canadian Foundation – lookingatthestars.org) have made the first step in extending our efforts to bring dignity and hope to the darkest corners of our society from Canada to Lithuania. We will not stop here. We will stay on the road (as your quartet of happy odd travellers in your play Smile at us, oh Lord) and will ultimately get to the Jerusalem, as you did in 1993.
You know, there still quite a few good people to be found here in Lithuania, people who are able to lift their heads up and to notice the stars in the sky – Virginijus Kulikauskas, the head of the Prison Department, Kastytis Skiečius, General manager of Baltijos Plienas, UAB, Edvinas Peleckas, General manager of Bincis, UAB in Jonava, Mindaugas Sinkevičius, Mayor of Jonava and of course our indispensable treasure- our “wedding musicians” – pianists Darius Mažintas, Lukas Geniušas, a young Canadian star Tony Yang and cellist Gleb Pysniak. And the list of good people continues…
We are ready to celebrate this very special occasion in the style of Litvak saga – literary works and news about Grigory Kanovich – by means of GIVING – gifting 6 classical music concerts to the Lithuanian prisons and one to the Afghan, Iranian and Iraqi refugee camp in Rukla – just next to Jonava.
The musicians will be on fire and the hearts of our listeners will melt as the snow melts in spring – the sounds of the works by Bach, Brahms, Chopin, Dvarionas, Frank, Kacanauskas, Liszt, Prokofiev, Ravel and Schumann will fill the air with love and hope for a better future.
And in spite of the distance separating us, you will hear the music and you will hear the applause and you will feel the warmth of the profound gratitude of our spellbound audiences…