The bronze statute dominating the town's main square will provide the backdrop to a concert by the celebrated Italian chamber orchestra I Solisti Veneti during which Tartini's violin will be played.

But the festivities will start with the launch of an exhibition at the Maritime Museum which will transport the visitors back to the time of arguably the biggest event in local history.

"This was a huge event of a calibre unlikely seen ever before or after, even in the future," the author of the exhibition Duška Žitko has told the STA.

The 1896 unveiling attracted a crowd equalling Piran's population of the time. Thousands of people from all over the Istrian peninsula and beyond arrived by sea to witness this homage to one of the most important personalities of the region.

Preparations for the erection of the statue took several years with the first committee set up as early as 1888, Žitko said.

The exhibition El Tartini in Piassa, which translates as Tartini in Square in the local dialect, portrays the chronological developments as well as the mood of the time through a series of photographs, documents and other archival material.

The display also showcases the main players organising the unveiling as well as the papers reporting on the event at the time from Vienna to Venice.

Piran-born Giuseppe Tartini is considered one of the biggest violinists of his time as well as a renowned composer and theoretician. His body of work includes 130 concertos and more than 170 sonatas for violin.