Free concert in the Cathedral at 4:30 PM
On Saturday, 18 July 2026, at 4:30 PM, Milan Cathedral will host a new musical event dedicated to the great international organ repertoire. The concert will feature Assel Smagulova, a Kazakh organist and professor at the Kulyash Baiseitova Kazakh National University of Arts, who will perform on the Cathedral’s organ in a programme devoted to Johann Sebastian Bach and Charles-Marie Widor.
Offered by the Veneranda Fabbrica del Duomo di Milano, the concert is free and open to the public until all available seats are filled, with no reservation required. It is a special invitation to citizens and visitors alike to share a moment of spirituality, culture and musical beauty in the heart of the Cathedral. For the occasion, the public will be admitted to the Cathedral from 4:00 PM through the entrance reserved for worshippers on the Cathedral façade (North Entrance Door, Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II side).
Within the evocative setting of the Duomo’s Gothic nave, the programme will lead the audience through some of the most significant masterpieces of the European organ repertoire. The concert opens with Johann Sebastian Bach’s Toccata, Adagio and Fugue in C major, BWV 564, a monumental work combining brilliant virtuosity, meditative intensity and contrapuntal mastery. It will be followed by the radiant Fantasia in G major, BWV 572, one of Bach’s most original compositions, distinguished by its impressive harmonic writing and remarkable expressive power.
The concert concludes with Charles-Marie Widor’s celebrated Toccata from Symphony No. 5 in F minor, Op. 42 No. 1, one of the most iconic works of the French organ tradition and among the most beloved pieces in the international concert repertoire.
Assel Smagulova is an organist and professor of organ and piano at the Kulyash Baiseitova Kazakh National University of Arts. Active both as an educator and as a concert performer, she regularly presents solo and chamber music programmes in concert halls and churches throughout Kazakhstan.
Her artistic activity is particularly devoted to the promotion of sacred music and the organ repertoire, introducing audiences to the richness and spiritual depth of these extraordinary compositions.
The concert will also be live-streamed on the “Duomo Milano TV” YouTube channel.
For further information:
Duomo Infopoint
Tel. +39 02 72023375
[email protected]
