Recently in Festival Category

La Bohème - 3^rd European Orchestra and Opera Workshop

16^th September - 13^th October 2009

The Summer Opera Bamberg is a European project aimed at promoting young orchestra and opera talent. It offers qualified students and college graduates of EU Member States the possibility to gather first practical opera experience for their professional career. Eligible are music students and young graduate musicians as well as talented vocal students and young, already professionally qualified singers with first opera experience. From the middle of September until the beginning of October Puccini's "La Bohème" will be produced together in a three-week workshop. Subsequently the opera will be presented several times in October at the theatre of Bamberg.

Edda Moser, the well known soprano singer and highly appreciated vocal teacher will offer an exclusive masterclass "singing" featuring one-on-one tuition for the soloist ensemble of the SOB. The artistic director of the house Rainer Lewandowski takes over the artistic direction. Music director of the SOB is Till Fabian Weser who already had responsibility for the successful Summer Opera Bamberg 2005 and 2007. Besides the artistic and musical courses the participants have the possibility to learn important strategies in the field of career development and self-management in personal one-on-one interviews with the career planner and tenor Dirk Schauß.

Read more about this at the Summer Opera Bamberg website:

   www.sommer-oper-bamberg.de

The 64^th Prague Spring International Music Festival

May 12 - June 6, 2009

In 1946 Prague and the whole Czechoslovak Republic celebrated the first anniversary of the end of the Second World War. At the same time, the Czech Philharmonic was celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of its founding, and the Prague Spring International Music Festival was born.

It was the result of almost seventy years of endeavours by people involved in music in Prague, including the German-speaking population, to organize annual music festivals with the participation of top soloists and orchestras from all over the world. Featured perfromers this year include Prague Radio Symphony Orcestra, Bohuslav Martinu Philharmonic, Juan Diego Flórez, Ladislav Doležel, Jaroslav Tuma, Shlomo Mintz, Janácek Chamber Orchestra, Kocian Quartet, Leonidas Kavakos, Jordi Savall, Il Giardino Armonico, Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Hawthorne String Quartet, and Libor Nováček.

Read more about this at the Prague Music Festival website:   www.festival.cz

InterHarmony International Music Festival 2009

San Francisco, California, USA
June 30 - July 12, 2009

Birklehof, Schwarzwald, Germany
July 22 - August 3, 2009

Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Germany
August 4 - 16, 2009

InterHarmony International Music Festival offers the opportunity to spend almost six weeks in Europe and America studying with an internationally renowned faculty of many well-known soloists and chamber musicians. The festival will be held in San Francisco, California, USA; Birklehof, Germany; and Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Germany. Each will offer four one-hour private lessons, ample practice facilities, and the opportunity to perform in orchestra and chamber-ensembles coached by faculty members. Master classes will be offered on various instruments and there will be numerous festival concerts, all of which will be open to the public. In addition, there will be planned excursions to a variety of fascinating destinations in each of the three locales.

Read more about this at the InterHarmony International Music Festival website:

   http://www.interharmony.com/

The music of Kaija Saariaho will be widely heard in the United States this summer. Saariaho's second opera 'Adriana Mater' will get its U.S. premiere on July 26, 2008, at the Santa Fe opera. In August, Saariaho is featured as the composer-in-residence of the Mostly Mozart festival in Lincoln Center, New York. The festival programme includes for example the U.S. premiere of the oratorio 'La Passion de Simone' on August 13, as well as Saariaho's cello concerto 'Notes on Light' (Aug 14) and the string quartet 'Terra Memoria' (Aug 21).

Full news in more depth can be found at http://www.fimic.fi/news

PROKOFIEV AND HIS WORLD

Two summer weekends, august 8–10 and august 15–17, offer expansive survey of music by the great Russian composer and his contemporaries, with life and times of Prokofiev further illuminated by preconcert talks, panel discussions, and a symposium

"Prokofiev and His World," a centerpiece of the seven-week 2008 Bard Summerscape Festival, offers first close examination of composer's life and career since historical archives left behind in Russia were partially opened in 2003

"Part boot camp for the brain, part spa for the spirit" –New York Times

Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y. – The last two weekends of Bard SummerScape 2008 will feature the world-renowned Bard Music Festival, returning in its 19^th annual season for an exploration of "Prokofiev and His World." The eleven summer programs of the Bard Music Festival will take place over two weekends on August 8–10 and August 15–17, to be followed by an autumn finale featuring two additional programs (October 24 and 25).

Szymanowski's opera King Roger and his "Pastoral Dance" Harnasie will be performed by the American Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Leon Botstein, in productions designed and directed by Lech Majewski, for five performances opening July 25

ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y. – Bard SummerScape's exploration of "Prokofiev and His World" will be enriched by productions of two rapturous works by Polish composer Karol Szymanowski – a contemporary and friend of Prokofiev's – opening Friday, July 25 for a run of five performances through August 3. Under music director Leon Botstein, SummerScape's resident American Symphony Orchestra will play both the acclaimed opera King Roger (The Shepherd) and Harnasie, a pastoral dance by the composer who is widely considered the father of modern Polish music. The Wroclaw Opera Chorus will perform, with Polish vocal soloists, and a children's choir. Both works will be directed and designed by Lech Majewski.