With an extraordinary status, the Presidential, or Kremlin, Regiment is under the Federal Bodyguard Service, and directly subordinates to the President of the Russian Federation as Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Armed Forces.
"The May 7 galas will start with guard mounting and sentry posting-a ceremony which the Kremlin now sees every Saturday. The Presidential Band and several military bands, Russian and foreign, will be playing at the time," Sergei Devyatov, the Kremlin public relations center chief, told RIA Novosti.
The Cathedral Square event will be spectacular with bands from the USA, France and the UK, Anton Orlov, presidential bandmaster, added in a Novosti interview.
Opening the concert will be Moscow Military Music Academy cadets. They will appear in Cathedral Square, 4 p.m., to bugle the Moscow parade fanfare. The Presidential Band will come next, together with the Presidential Regiment's Guard of Honor company.
Replacing them will be the Central Band of the French Air Force; Britain's Irish Guards and Grenadier Guards drummers and bagpipers, and the RAF Central Band; and the band of the US land troops in Europe. The Moscow cadets are to reappear next.
All bands plus Moscow Military Conservatory students will come together at about 5 p.m. under conductor Valery Khalilov, in charge of the Russian Armed Forces bands.
Seven bands will play all together Beethoven's European Anthem, "Glory" from Mikhail Glinka's 19th century classic opera "A Life for the Tsar" with Ivan the Great's bells chiming in, and contemporary composer David Tukhmanov's "Victory Day", a tune famous in Russia for years. "A Slav Woman's Farewell", one of the best-known Russian marches, will crown the concert.
