What: The 25th Annual Summer Music Festival
When: June 8 - 28, 2009
Where: Packard Hall, 5 W. Cache La Poudre St., and the Edith Kinney Gaylord Cornerstone Arts Center, 825 N. Cascade Ave. – both on the Colorado College campus in Colorado Springs, Colo.
Tickets: $20 each for two Festival Orchestra Concerts; $25 each for five Festival Artist Concerts – tickets available at all TicketsWest outlets; by calling (866) 464-2626 (toll free); or online at www.ticketswest.com. Free admission to Music at Midday, Honors Concert, Children’s Concert and Concerto Readings presentations.
Details: http://artsfestival.ColoradoCollege.edu/MusicFestival
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – May 11, 2009 – Concertmasters and principals from the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, The Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, The Colorado Symphony, The American Ballet Theatre Orchestra, The New York City Ballet and Opera Orchestras, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and The Cleveland Orchestra; distinguished faculty from the Juilliard School and Eastman Schools of Music, McGill University, The University of Colorado and The Cleveland Institute of Music; members of The Ying Quartet, The American Brass Quintet and the Quattro Mani Piano Duo: These are the affiliations of the musicians who comprise the faculty artists of the 25th Annual Colorado College Summer Music Festival.
Each summer, musicians of this caliber have converged upon Colorado Springs to produce superb performances of chamber music masterpieces while teaching and coaching a select group of American and international student musicians in the ways of superior chamber and orchestral performances. This year’s festival will be held from June 8- 28 on the Colorado College campus and will include five Festival Artist Concerts, two Festival Orchestra Concerts and myriad free chamber and outreach concerts presented by the students.
“We feel that our festival offers a special experience for everyone involved,” said Susan Grace, music director and one of the faculty pianists at the festival. “Our audiences are so passionate and appreciative of the excellence and intimacy of our performances; our students bring us an incredibly high quality of musicianship and have an opportunity to coach and perform with a dream roster of faculty; our faculty get to do what they love most for three-weeks every summer and revel in the chance to dig into seldom-performed chamber music masterpieces.”
Cellist Bion Tsang, bronze medalist at the IX International Tchaikovsky Competition and faculty member at the University of Texas—Austin, has been involved with the festival since 2002. He says of the festival: “I wish I had known about the Colorado College Summer Music Festival when I was still a student! Despite the fact that the students have an intensive three-week schedule of orchestral, chamber and solo work, there is a relaxed, collegial relationship between the faculty and students that I have not seen elsewhere. It makes for an enormously rewarding and memorable experience for all every June.”
Over the years the festival has been known for having consistently packed houses – especially for its Festival Artist Concerts. “It’s true that we have great attendance,” Grace said. “But somehow we manage to find seats for everyone who shows up for our performances. We urge anyone who wants to experience our festival to come and hear us.” Packard Hall is the facility where all concerts have historically been held. It also houses the faculty and student rehearsals. It is here that the Festival Artist Concerts and Student Chamber Recitals will be held.
Over the years, the Festival Orchestra Concerts have grown to be as popular as their faculty counterpart. “We’ve always had fine performances from our student orchestra,” Grace said. “But since Scott Yoo (music director and conductor of the Metamorphosen Chamber Orchestra and Festival Mozaic) became our regular conductor five years ago, their level of accomplishment has been truly astounding. These concerts have become the hottest ticket in town.”
This season, the orchestra will perform a world premiere by New York-based composer and saxophonist Patrick Zimmerli. Commissioned on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of Colorado College’s Summer Music Festival, “Light, Color, Line, Symbol” is a musical celebration of architecture. The piece is in four movements, each based on a building made in America by a living architect: Tadao Ando’s Pulitzer Foundation in St. Louis; Steven Holl’s St. Ignatius Chapel at Seattle University; Antoine Predock’s Edith Kinney Gaylord Cornerstone Arts Center at Colorado College; and Santiago Calatrava’s extension to the Milwaukee Art Museum.Accompanying the performance will be a video on multiple screens that will not only display the architecture. but offer a three-dimensional, immersive experience of each building as the piece is performed.
A prolific composer, Zimmerli’s catalogue includes two four-movement piano trios, written for the Seattle Chamber Music Festival and released on Arabesque Recordings; two four-movement piano concertos with jazz percussion, written for the Metamorphosen Chamber Orchestra, to be recorded in the fall with pianist Ambre Hammond and percussionist Satoshi Takeishi; and the Chamber Symphony premiered by the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra for the Engine408 series in March 2009.
The New York Times said of Zimmerli’s Piano Trio No. 1: “The score’s irresistible energy seemed to come from everywhere: classical forms, jazz harmonies, and Arvo Pärt-like meditativeness, were all on tap, and the last bars were pure Romanticism.”
Although audience and critical acclaim abounds for both Festival Artist Concerts and Festival Orchestra Concerts, the essence of the festival emanates from the relationship between the 25 faculty artists and the 47 students who attend the festival on a full scholarship. Long-time Summer Music Festival audience member Chris O’Shea says: “The camaraderie between the students and the faculty makes the Summer Music Festival especially meaningful. The music grows more powerful every year because of this relationship. We keep coming back year after year and are amazed by the high standards and level of musicianship. Scott Yoo has supercharged the whole festival since his arrival.”
The Summer Music Festival has built a loyal following over the past 25 years. As audience member Marti Booth says: “World-class musicians playing music I love and music I’ve never heard – with true artistry and exquisite taste! The Festival Artists play chamber music in cozy Packard Hall, the one with perfect acoustics! I love it!”
Tickets for Festival Artist Concerts are $25 each, and include reserved seats on Packard Hall’s main level. Festival Orchestra Concerts are $20 each, with all reserved seating. Tickets are available at TicketsWest outlets by calling (866) 464-2626, or online at www.ticketswest.com.
Complete information including festival artist bios: http://artsfestival.ColoradoCollege.edu/MusicFestival
About the Colorado College Summer Festival of the Arts
Colorado College’s Summer Festival of the Arts features three major festivals within it, as well as additional world-class film, world music, theater, literary readings, comedy and art events throughout the summer. This year, it also encompasses the Enrich Your Life! summer courses for the community. The Summer Music Festival, a teaching festival in which young musicians from around the world learn from and perform with professional musicians who also present their concert series, runs June 8-28. The Dance! Festival runs June 29-July 17, with dance education opportunities open to the public, and gala performances on July 11 and 12. The Vocal Arts Symposium runs July 19-Aug. 7, with opera, jazz and musical theater performances. See http://artsfestival.coloradocollege.edu for details on all four major parts of the Summer Festival of the Arts. For details on the entire summer’s offerings, see www.ColoradoCollege.edu/News_Events
About Colorado College
Colorado College is a nationally prominent, four-year liberal arts and sciences college that was founded in Colorado Springs in 1874. The college operates on the innovative Block Plan, in which its 1,845 students study one course at a time in intensive 3½-week blocks. For more information, visit www.ColoradoCollege.edu <http://www.ColoradoCollege.edu>.