Impromptu 2019

IMPROMPTU A Magazine About the Aspen Music Festival and School

Summer 2019 | FREE

PIANIST INON BARNATAN ‘BRINGING IT’ TO ASPEN

Plus 70 YEARS: A LOOK BACK IN PHOTOS A MAP OF AMERICAN COMPOSERS MUSIC AND LEADERSHIP

ASPEN MUSIC FESTIVAL AND SCHOOL

As the Aspen Music Festival and School celebrates its 70th anniversary, the 2019 season explores the theme, Being American, with works by composers ranging from Gershwin, Ives, Barber, Bernstein, and Copland, including Appalachian Spring, to Wynton Marsalis, John Adams, Stephen Sondheim, and Philip Glass; as well as settings of literary works by Whitman, Melville, Dickinson, and Poe. Like America itself, American classical music reflects the sweeping diversity of American culture and landscape. Some sparkles with freshness, hope, the promise of a frontier; some—like blues and jazz—evokes the rawness of the human experience. Some reflects home countries left behind by émigrés who fled fascism in the 1930s, or the blended musical vernacular and heritage of more recent immigrants and first-generation Americans. This summer, Being American offers a kaleidoscope of musical voices to explore.

Nearly 1,000 musicians gather in Aspen each summer, as more than 700 of the world’s best music students join more than 200 of the top professional performing and teaching classical artists. With performances by five full orchestras, dozens of chamber music concerts, fully produced operas, as well as master classes, lectures, and children’s events, the 2019 AMFS season has something for everyone.

Visit www.aspenmusicfestival.com for a full schedule of events, information, or to purchase tickets; or call the Box Office at 970 925 9042.

For an abridged calendar of events, see pages 34–38.

GRITTANI CREATIVE

2019 SEASON JUNE 27–AUGUST 19

FEATURES

10 INON BARNATAN— ‘BRINGING IT’ TO ASPEN Pianist Inon Barnatan talks with James Inverne about the special quality of the Aspen experience and how it has shaped his education as an artist.

16 AMFS CELEBRATES 70 YEARS As the AMFS celebrates its 70th Anniversary, Impromptu takes a look back in pictures.

26 COMPOSING AMERICA A look at the breadth and depth of the American composers featured this season.

30 MUSIC & NATURE Alumnus Conrad Tao and AMFS students share their favorite places outside the Benedict Music Tent.

ON THE COVER AND ABOVE INON BARNATAN MARCO BORGGREVE

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IMPROMPTU EDITOR IN CHIEF Laura E. Smith MANAGING EDITOR Kristin Cleveland ASSISTANT EDITOR Christina Thomsen GRAPHIC DESIGN BeeSpring Designs Impromptu is a publication of the Aspen Music Festival and School.

CONTACT Aspen Music Festival and School 225 Music School Road Aspen, CO 81611 info@aspenmusic.org ADMINISTRATION 970 925 3254 BOX OFFICE 970 925 9042

www.aspenmusicfestival.com Aspen Music Festival and School President and CEO Alan Fletcher and pianist Jonathan Biss enjoy a performance in the Benedict Music Tent.

ALSO IN THIS ISSUE 5 NOTES FROM THE FESTIVAL Benedict Music Tent at 20; South Pacific: In Concert; students from around the world; and more.

34 ABRIDGED EVENTS CALENDAR Explore some of the hundreds of events taking place this summer.

39 FACULTY FOCUS Nicholas McGegan and Brinton Averil Smith reflect on music and leadership.

42 STUDENT SPOTLIGHT Harp fellow Adam Phan reflects on making connections and sharing his music.

JUNE 27–AUGUST 18, 2019 Robert Spano Music Director Alan Fletcher President and CEO

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2019 70TH ANNIVERSARY SEASON

NOTES

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FROM THE FESTIVAL

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NOTES FROM THE FESTIVAL

The Benedict Music Tent at Twenty As the Aspen Music Festival and School celebrates its 70th anniversary, it also marks the 20th season of concerts in the Benedict Music Tent. Designed by Aspen architect Harry Teague (who also designed Harris Concert Hall and the AMFS’s Bucksbaum Campus), the Tent was constructed in 1999. With its curving translucent roof and louvered walls that open to the surrounding meadows, Teague’s design preserved the ambiance of the earlier Saarinen and Bayer tents dramatically improving acoustics and backstage facilities. On Final Sunday, August 18, Music Director Robert Spano conducts Mahler’s Second Symphony, “Resurrection,” the same work that opened the new Tent in 2000. Seraphic Fire and the Colorado Symphony Orchestra Chorus join forces for this powerful piece with soloists Mané Galoyan soprano, and Kelley O’Connor mezzo-soprano.

On July 22, the Aspen Music Festival and School collaborates with Theatre Aspen to present a very special one-night-only concert production of the classic Rodgers & Hammerstein musical South Pacific. Broadway director and Tony Award nominee Lonny Price (Sunset Boulevard, 110 in the Shade, A Class Act) and leading Broadway music director and conductor Andy Einhorn (Carousel and Hello Dolly!) will lead a 55-piece orchestra of AMFS students, a chorus of Aspen Opera Center singers, and a cast of Broadway’s brightest to bring this timeless story to the Benedict Music Tent stage.

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South Pacific IN CONCERT

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SOUTH PACIFIC: IN CONCERT

NOTES FROM THE FESTIVAL

STUDENTS THE WORLD OVER The Aspen Music Festival and School has the most diverse student body of any summer classical music program. Meet five of the more than 650 elite music students training in Aspen this summer.

Marcel Cara is a twenty-two-year-old harp student from Paris, France. This will be his first summer in Aspen, where he will study with Nancy Allen.

Josiah Chabalala travels to Aspen for his first summer at the AMFS from Kimberley, South Africa. The twentyseven-year-old will study trumpet with Raymond Mase, Kevin Cobb, Stuart Stephenson, David Krauss, and Thomas Hooten.

Hanna Panamarenka comes to Aspen from Gomel, Belarus. The nineteen-year-old violinist will study with Espen Lilleslåtten during her first year at the AMFS. Binh Phan will travel to Aspen from Hanoi, Vietnam, for his first summer of study at the AMFS. The twenty-twoyear-old trumpet student will be participating in the American Brass Quintet Seminar @Aspen.

Francesco Zecchi comes to Aspen from Florence, Italy. This will be the twenty-three-year-old’s first year of viola study in Aspen with artist-faculty members Victoria Chiang and James Dunham.

Sila: The Breath of the World

ALEX IRVIN (RIGHT)

Country Music: A Special Evening with Ken Burns and Edgar Meyer Ken Burns has produced and directed some of the most compelling and critically acclaimed documentaries in television history.

In a special post-season event, Burns joins bassist and composer Edgar Meyer (also an AMFS alumnus and artist-faculty member) and AMFS president and CEO Alan Fletcher on August 20 to share a special preview of his new project, Country Music. The evening includes clips from the new series, as well as commentary by Burns and conversation with Meyer and Fletcher.

Composer John Luther Adams draws inspiration from the great outdoors when he creates, seeking to help us “remember our place within the larger community of life on earth.” On July 21 at 2 pm, the AMFS presents a free performance of his outdoor sonic work, Sila: The Breath of the World, in the outdoor spaces by the Benedict Music Tent and Harris Concert Hall. Concert-goers can wander in and around the musicians to fully experience the music.

Sila was inspired by the worldview of Alaska’s Inuit people and the “unique musical world grounded in space, stillness, and elemental forces” that Adams found while living there for almost 40 years.

For Adams, music is a lifelong search for home—an invitation to slow down and pay attention.

During the 1970s and ’80s, he worked full time as an environmental activist in northern Alaska, but he eventually dedicated himself entirely to music, with the belief that, ultimately, music can do more than politics to change the world.

In this outdoor work for winds, brass, voices, percussion, and strings, Adams employs music as a way to reclaim our connections with place, wherever we may be.

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A MUSIC FESTIVAL USER’S GUIDE

FOR THE FIRST TIMER If you’re new to classical music, and/ or to the Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS), try one of the following: a Sunday afternoon or Friday evening signature orchestra concert; an opera with sets, lighting—and plot intrigue—to keep your interest; or any concert with Beethoven on the program. These are all accessible entry points that offer the listener both exquisite artistry and a solid place from which to cultivate future listening experiences.

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A few sure-things in this category are Mozart’s classic comic opera, The Marriage of Figaro on August 13, 15, and 17; the Sunday, July 21 Aspen Festival Orchestra concert featuring Elgar’s “Enigma” Variations, conducted by the great Leonard Slatkin and also featuring rising-star pianist Seong-Jin Cho playing Rachmaninoff’s dramatic and lyrical Piano Concerto No. 2; or the Friday, July 19 Aspen Chamber Symphony concert with Charles Ives’s Three Places in New England and Beethoven’s Second Symphony.

TIP On Wednesdays, all-student Aspen Philharmonic Orchestras concerts are a fraction the cost and feature some of the repertoire’s most-loved works, such as Dvořák’s Ninth Symphony “From the New World” (July 10) and Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet Suites (July 24).

ANOTHER TIP Enjoy any concert absolutely free by sitting on the Karetsky Music Lawn surrounding the Benedict Music Tent!

FOR THE CULTURALLY ADVENTUROUS Do you want your musical experience to challenge you, expand you, leave you different from when you arrived?

There are events all summer for that, too.

The AMFS offers the perfect platform for artists to plumb the depths of a given composer or form, and many do.

On July 10 and 11, harpsichordist Jory Vinikour leads a hand-picked cadre of rising stars in two evening recitals featuring Bach’s Complete Brandenburg Concertos. Several Bauhaus-inspired works appear on the program this summer, including selections from Gunther Schuller’s Seven Studies on Themes of Paul Klee (July 14), Schoenberg’s Fünf Klavierstücke (July 20), George Antheil’s Ballet mécanique (August 5), and Paul Hindemith’s Concert Music for Piano, Brass, and Harps (August 17).

The 2019 season’s exploration of the theme “Being American” also offers lis-

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With more than 400 events each season, the Aspen Music Festival and School’s summer schedule can be overwhelming to look at, much less choose from. Impromptu offers some guidance for different tastes and styles for the 2019 season.

FACING PAGE Alumna and opera superstar Renée Fleming works with an Aspen Opera Center student at a master class (inset); concert-goers enjoy music from the Karetsky Music Lawn.

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RIGHT The Aspen Festival Orchestra performs on Final Sunday.

teners a chance to examine the work of some of America’s greatest composers from the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries. On Friday, July 26, pianist Inon Barnatan performs Barber’s Piano Concerto on a program that also features Bernstein’s West Side Story Symphonic Dances conducted by Alondra de la Parra. Also, on August 15, Aspen favorite Robert McDuffie performs the original chamber arrangement of Copland’s iconic Appalachian Spring.

There are also programs curated specifically to help the audience members hear music afresh—or simply hear fresh music. Stephen Hartke’s new cello concerto Da pacem premieres July 17, performed by Darrett Adkins. Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti makes her Aspen debut in a performance of Wynton Marsalis’s Concerto in D for Violin and Orchestra on August 7. And the Percussion Collective joins the Aspen Festival Orchestra to perform Drum Circles, a new work for percussion and orchestra by Christopher Theofanidis on August 11. On July 30, the AMFS presents a concert performance of Missy Mazzoli’s recently premiered and highly acclaimed Proving Up, a chamber opera set on the 1860s frontier where homesteading families struggle in pursuit of the American Dream.

Or, for an intellectual perspective to complement the concerts you attend, try a free High Notes Discussion at noon on Wednesdays to hear AMFS President and CEO Alan Fletcher in conversation with guest artists and

composers, or one of the Festival’s Preludes: Preconcert Talks presented by Asadour Santourian, AMFS vice president for artistic administration and artistic advisor, and other speakers at 3 pm Sundays in Harris Concert Hall.

nearly every day of the week. Some to try: Spotlight Recital at Harris Concert Hall each Wednesday and Thursday at 3:30 pm, or the Music with a View series on the beautiful roof at the Aspen Art Museum on Tuesdays at 6 pm.

COST-CONSCIOUS

INSIDER’S VIEW

Looking to dabble with little-to-no risk? Try something free or inexpensive while you explore what you might love best.

Start with the free Karetsky Music Lawn from where you can hear any concert in the Benedict Music Tent al fresco. The Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra’s Tuesday afternoon concerts are free and provide an opportunity to see the next generation of up-and-coming talents from the Aspen Conducting Academy, a training program for promising young conductors guided by AMFS Music Director Robert Spano. Or, get up close for just $20 at an orchestral dress rehearsal on Friday or Sunday mornings. They may not offer quite the full intensity of the performance, but they are great for getting a taste.

The AMFS also offers dozens of free recitals with its music students, the best and the brightest emerging youngadult musicians from around the world.

You can find free chamber concerts

The AMFS is a premier concert presenter and also the country’s leading summer training program for emerging classical musicians. Every day hundreds of students and artist-faculty engage in lessons, classes, and rehearsals, sharing their musical insights with each other and honing their craft.

Audience members can get a peek at the heart of this process in master classes and competitions that are open to the public all summer long.

Master classes, where teachers coach students individually in front of an audience, are held each Tuesday at 1 pm in Harris Concert Hall, with teaching artists such as Renée Fleming (July 30) and Augustin Hadelich (August 6). Dozens more free master classes, on nearly every instrument, are held throughout the summer.

See www.aspenmusicfestival.com or pick up a Weekly Schedule tearsheet at hotels and visitors centers around town for a full schedule.

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INON BARNATAN

‘BRINGING IT’ TO ASPEN

By James Inverne

“Aspen embodies so much of what the United States is, in all sorts of ways. It’s hard not to feel that . . . when you’re amidst the majesty of the Colorado scenery, and then you have all of these people coming in from all of these different countries, and it’s this melting pot. . . . Very few places exemplify that so well as Aspen. It’s where opportunity and diversity and adventure meet in the best possible way.”

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Sometimes a new artist comes to the Aspen Music Festival without having first attended the school, and they nonetheless make such a strong impression that they immediately become part of the AMFS “family.” When that happens, you know the impression has been mutual. These artists return, again and again, and you can see in their demeanor on stage, you can even hear in the freedom of their playing, that at Aspen they are home. Such was precisely the case with Israeli-American pianist Inon Barnatan. He has returned to Aspen every year since his debut in 2008, becoming an ever-more central part of the proceedings (he even opened the 2018 Winter Music Recital Series). And Barnatan, who has since become a naturalized American citi-

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zen, remembers his debut very well.

“Growing up in Israel,” he says, “we were very aware of the Aspen Music Festival and School. It was and is famous everywhere, considered the foremost place where you get the best of music education and the best of music-making. And my first appearance there came right when I first arrived in the United States. I played the Chausson concerto with Robert McDuffie—in fact I saw Bobby recently and we remembered that wonderful concert!”

It was indeed a memorable evening, a special event to honor McDuffie, an established Aspen favorite. Other colleagues were included, but the violinist generously shared the lion’s share of stage time with this young Israeli pianist, whose reputation as an emerging

major artist had preceded him to the United States. That night, together, they played Kreisler, Poldini, Lehar, Heuberger, Mozart and, as Barnatan rightly remembers, the Chausson Concerto in D major. It was a kaleidoscopic showcase for a young artist, and Barnatan clearly captivated both the audience in Harris Hall, and the Festival’s artistic team. He returned the very next year, this time with two concerts, one in Harris Hall and one in the Benedict Music Tent—alongside cellist Alisa Weilerstein in the first, violinist Adele Anthony in the second.

He remembers that concert with Weilerstein as also memorable, but in a very different way from the debut that preceded it. Before diving into this anecdote, though, there is one thing

MARCO BORGGREVE (P. 10-11); ALEX IRVIN (ABOVE)

Barnatan in 2011, during one of his early recital performances at the Aspen Music Festival and School.

you should know about Inon Barnatan.

This is not a guy who readily admits to fatigue or any kind of setback (to the extent that while being interviewed for this article he mentioned in passing that he had a fever, but wouldn’t hear of rescheduling); in fact he tends to give the impression that jumping on stage for even the most demanding program comes as naturally to him as breathing.

So if he says he was “wiped out,” we can safely assume he was on the floor.

In fact he was, literally, on the floor.

“Alisa and I were both for some reason wiped out,” he recounts, “We’d both of us arrived the day before and I don’t know why–I don’t usually get affected by altitude—but we were both lying on the carpet backstage, moments before the performance, feeling like we weren’t going to be able to get through it. I felt completely drained.”

Did he get up off the floor? Of course! They both did, and they went out and ‘killed it.’ “When you have an audience as great as Aspen’s, an audience that listens and that you know appreciates all the work that has gone into what you’re playing, you are inspired to rise up to the level that they deserve,” he says, “We went on stage that night when we felt we couldn’t possibly, and

that concert taught me a lot about my own capacities—not to be afraid of being tired or being sick, to believe that when you get on stage the music and the audience and the adrenaline will carry you through. And it was a special performance, that night. After we came offstage, Alisa and I were so elated, we still talk about it!”

Perhaps it will come up in conversation again this summer. Barnatan and Weilerstein will reunite at the Festival on July 25th, again in Harris Hall, for a fascinating program including Beethoven’s Ghost Trio, Schoenberg’s Verklarte Nacht, and Shostakovich’s Fifteenth Symphony in a chamber version alongside violinist Sergey Khachatryan and percussionist Colin Currie.

“Pushing” is a recurrent Aspen theme for Barnatan. It’s one of the things he loves about the place. He talks about his sit-downs with Asadour Santourian, Aspen’s vice president for artistic administration and artistic advisor, to talk about future programs—“Asadour has so much curiosity about people and repertoire, it’s an inspiration to plan with him. If you don’t put the right people with the right repertoire, those two things at the same time, a work can fall totally flat. But that’s part of the ad-

venture. Asadour doesn’t not do something because he’s not sure it’s going to work. And that’s how I think about programming. If you just stay in your own comfort zone you never have the adventures, you just do what you know you do well.”

And so, Aspen facilitates, encourages Barnatan to push on to the next adventure. “This year is an interesting example,” he reflects, “I’m playing the Barber Piano Concerto, which is a very difficult piece for both the pianist and the orchestra, and we will put it together in a relatively short amount of time, together with musicians who have a lot to do in the Festival and a conductor whom I assume has conducted the concerto before because it’s such a rarity. Yet I really believe in that piece as one of the great twentieth century concertos, and Asadour was excited about the prospect and was willing to try it and to really push everybody. And now—we’ll see if it works!”

The feeling of adventure, of risk, of pushing, extends to the students, as Barnatan approvingly notes. “The students are really pushed. But whenever there is a feeling that you’re going through something together, rather than everybody doing what they as individ-

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Barnatan with friend, collaborator, and cellist Alisa Weilerstein during a 2009 recital in Harris Concert Hall.

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uals usually do, whenever you are required to push yourself with colleagues and work through something together, there always develops a camaraderie. There’s no better training than doing that for everybody. To feel what it means to have responsibility for other people as well as your own playing and at the same time to see that the soloist and conductor are also pushing themselves, and are 100 percent devoted to making this thing work, that is really the greatest inspiration that students can have.”

Still, it sounds like tough love. He laughs. “People might think that, for musicians, summer festivals are some respite from the season! What is true is that you come to Aspen for ideal conditions for making music; you come to be in nature and with colleagues and to be inspired together. It’s a very important experience.” But not an easy one, necessarily, nor should it be. Does he ever get nervous, especially when working in these concentrated conditions and often on works that are unfamiliar? He doesn’t seem like the kind of artist who suffers from that particular ailment.

“It’s funny,” he concedes, “I rarely get nervous. But then the only reason to be nervous is if you’re unprepared.

If you prepare properly, there’s no reason for nerves. Sometimes you do feel uncertainty, the weight of the occasion, which is a kind of nervousness.

So if you’re playing something very often done, like Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto, you can be very aware how many musicians and music students

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are in the audience, who know the piece well and have heard it from many different pianists. You’re much more aware of that with Tchaikovsky than something like the Barber concerto, which is rarely heard, or Alan Fletcher’s concerto, which I played at Aspen as the world premiere.

“But you try to approach the performance with the attitude that you’re not being judged, but rather you are presenting something to an audience, saying, ‘Listen to this!’ You’re sharing your interpretation—because I don’t believe there’s only one way of playing something. That’s the only way that I know how to perform.”

It’s a lesson that students of a nervous disposition would do well to absorb, and on every Aspen visit Barnatan teaches a master class and talks about exactly that subject. But he goes further. “In orchestral rehearsals at Aspen, I engage with the orchestra much more directly than I do in other places—as long as the conductor is happy with that—because many of them are students and it’s important to me that they feel there’s a connection and that we’re all in it together. That they’re not accompanying, we’re all playing in

tandem and have a shared responsibility for the result. I love that, and it’s not something you can often do with many professional orchestras because they feel you’re trying to teach them something. At Aspen I can do that because it’s understood that this experience is not only for me or only for the audience, it’s primarily for them, the students.” In 2017, Barnatan gave the world premiere of Alan Fletcher’s Piano Concerto, under music director Robert Spano. Fletcher, an esteemed composer, is also AMFS’s president and CEO so, one might feel, the pressure was on for his pianist. The premiere was a great success and Barnatan and Spano went on to repeat it with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic (where it won especially adulatory reviews).

“That was a great experience,” recalls Barnatan, “because it’s so rare to have the opportunity to do a new concerto more than once, in different places, with different orchestras.” Yet, he is quick to add, the performances with the famed LA Phil or Atlanta Symphony were not necessarily better than the Aspen premiere. “I don’t have lesser expectations from the orchestras in

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Barnatan, Alan Fletcher, and Robert Spano after the 2017 world premiere of Fletcher's Piano Concerto in the Benedict Music Tent.

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In the years Barnatan has been coming to the Aspen Music Festival and School, he has transformed from a young rising star to a teacher and mentor to students (top) and wellloved member of the AMFS family (bottom, with Robert Spano).

Aspen than I do from the LA Phil,” he says, “In some ways the most important thing is the approach to a work, how committed the players are. And in Aspen they were totally committed, also because the young people have a great, gung-ho attitude to these things, a truly adventurous spirit. All three orchestras were equally curious about the piece and gave it their all, so the Aspen performance stands up against any competition.”

“In some ways,” he continues, “Aspen felt like a laboratory for that piece, especially having the compos-

er there and being able to work closely with him, in a concentrated space.

You don’t always get that kind of experience. And add to that the unique Aspen vibe—you feel like you are in an idealized situation for inspiration. You feel that everywhere and always at Aspen. It’s everywhere, whether in the mountain scenery, or the other musicians all around you, or the students, or the professionalism.”

Which choice phrase leads him to consider this season’s theme—Being American—and how the qualities he’s just mentioned are, quintessentially,

American. “You know, Aspen embodies so much of what the United States is, in all sorts of ways. It’s hard not to feel that, first of all, when you’re amidst the majesty of the Colorado scenery, and then you have all of these people coming in from all of these different countries, and it’s this melting pot.

That’s what the United States is supposed to be about, and is most of the time. Very few places exemplify that so well as Aspen. It’s where opportunity and diversity and adventure meet in the best possible way. And the staff at Aspen facilitate all of this—the difference between good and great are in the details, and Aspen’s staff thinks about every detail and makes every effort and allows the musicians to really concentrate on doing the same in their music making. That kind of highestlevel professionalism, of facilitating the best that humanity can strive towards, that is American too.”

He reflects for a moment. “To be given the time and mental space to work on something meaningful, that’s rare in this busy life.” He searches for the appropriate phrase. He finds it. “It’s all conducive to ‘bringing it,’ as the kids would say!”

Inon Barnatan presents a recital with Alisa Weilerstein, Sergey Khachatryan, and Colin Currie July 25 in Harris Concert Hall. See him perform Barber’s Piano Concerto with the Aspen Chamber Symphony, conducted by Alondra de la Parra, July 26 in the Benedict Music Tent.

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THE ASPEN MUSIC FESTIVAL AND SCHOOL AT 70

MARGARET DURRANCE

A LOOK BACK IN PICTURES

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In 1949 Walter and Elizabeth Paepcke founded the Aspen

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Music Festival and School as part of a two-week Goethe Bicentennial Convocation and Music Festival celebrating the eighteenth-century German writer, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

The convocation (which also marked the inception of the Aspen Institute) was the brainchild of the Paepckes and Robert Maynard Hutchins, then-president of the University of Chicago. The goal of the gathering was to focus on Goethe’s humanism and its applications for healing in the aftermath of World War II. The concerts and lectures of the convocations took place literally—as essayist Bruce Berger described it in his 1999 book of the same name—in “a tent in the meadow.” Along with lectures by such luminaries as Albert Schweitzer and Thornton Wilder, the residents of Aspen also enjoyed music by the Minneapolis Symphony, conducted by Dimitri Mitropoulos, and artists such as violinists Nathan Milstein and Roman Totenberg, cellist Gregor Piatigorsky, pianist Arthur Rubinstein, among many others.

Today, as the Aspen Music Festival and School celebrates its seventieth anniversary and the twentieth anniversary of the Benedict Music Tent, music permeates Aspen. That “tent in the meadow” has grown to become a gathering place for music students and the professionals who teach them, guest artists, and classical music audiences from around the world.

FACING PAGE The original tent for the Goethe Bicentennial, designed by Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen (who designed the Gateway Arch in St. Louis).

ABOVE (TOP) The Music Festival’s BayerBenedict Tent, which stood from 1965 to 1999; (BOTTOM) The Aspen Music Festival and School’s Benedict Music Tent today.

1950s The professional musicians who came for the Goethe Bicentennial were so taken by their Aspen experience that they continued to return annually with their students for summer educational and performance opportunities. They taught in private homes and public spaces in and around Aspen, and residents recall the sounds of music drifting out of buildings throughout the town. In 1950, composer Igor Stravinsky became the first conductor to present his own works at the Music Festival, and afterwards, encouraged other composers to be a part of the Festival. The Music School enrolled its first official class of students in 1951 and in 1954, the Festival musicians established the Music Associates of Aspen and registered the organization as a nonprofit with the State of Colorado.

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In 1965, a new, larger music tent designed by German American Bauhaus artist, designer, and architect Herbert Bayer replaces the original tent designed by Eero Saarinen. In 1964, Mr. and Mrs. Robert O. Anderson generously donate the twenty-three-acre site of the former Newman Silver Mine just outside of Aspen to the AMFS for its music campus. In the summers, the campus becomes the center of activities for the Festival’s artist-faculty and students, with buildings designed by the late Aspen architect Fritz Benedict providing basic studios, practice rooms, and rehearsal space. In 1969, the AMFS begin leasing its facilities to Aspen Country Day School during the winter months, starting a relationship between the two entities that continues today.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP Although newer and larger, the Bayer-Benedict Tent still required pitching and striking every season.

Students during rehearsal in the Bayer-Benedict Tent.

The Newman Silver Mine (Photo courtesy of the Aspen Historical Society, Shaw Collection) Mr. and Mrs. R.O. Anderson overlooking what is now the Bucksbaum Campus.

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GEOFFREY WHARTON (BOTTOM); MARGARET DURRANCE (MIDDLE); CHARLES ABBOTT (TOP)

1960s

1970s The Festival welcomed many classical music giants during the 1970s, as well as a few up-andcoming artists. American composer Aaron Copland spent the summer of 1975 as AMFS composer in residence during its Conference on Contemporary Music, and Itzhak Perlman and Isaac Stern were featured artists. In 1979, Danny Kaye, well-known entertainer and UNICEF ambassador, conducted the Aspen Festival Orchestra during the 30th anniversary season.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP Aaron Copland at the 1975 Conference on Contemporary Music.

A young Yo-Yo Ma performs at the Music Festival.

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Students on the Music School campus.

Mezzo-soprano and AMFS opera artist-faculty Jan DeGaetani (center), and American composer George Crumb (right) review his score with an unidentified fellow artist, 1974.

Entertainer and UNICEF ambassador Danny Kaye rehearses with the Aspen Festival Orchestra.

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1980s In 1980, another well-known entertainer brought attention to the Festival. John Denver performed with the Aspen Festival Orchestra, and the event was filmed as part of a television music special which aired the following year in 1981 on ABC. James Galway performed with Denver that summer and returned as a Festival guest artist in 1985. This decade also marked the arrival of several remarkable students who would go on to successful solo careers.

TOP John Denver with the Aspen Festival Orchestra.

CENTER, LEFT TO RIGHT Violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg shares a light moment during rehearsal with conductor James DePreist.

Sarah Chang began studying at the AMFS at age five. Here she performs as a soloist at age nine.

BOTTOM James Galway with tin whistle and AMFS students.

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CHARLES ABBOTT

Wynton Marsalis as a young guest artist at the Festival in 1985. (On August 7, 2019, violinist Nicola Benedetti performs Marsalis’s Violin Concerto, which he wrote for her.)

1990s

CHARLES ABBOTT (BOTTOM); TIMOTHY HURSLEY (CENTER LEFT) ROY WILLEY (CENTER MIDDLE, RIGHT); ELLE LOGAN (TOP)

The 500-seat Harris Concert Hall, designed by Aspen architect Harry Teague, opened in 1993 after construction of the mostly underground recital hall persevered through one of the snowiest winters in Aspen’s history. It became the Festival’s first permanent performance venue. As the decade came to a close and the Festival expanded, the need for a new, more permanent primary performance facility became clear, and in 1999, construction began on the Benedict Music Tent.

TOP Harris Concert Hall, within.

MIDDLE The Hall under construction.

BOTTOM By the late 1990s, some seating in the Bayer-Benedict Tent required an umbrella on rainy days.

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2000s

TOP AND ABOVE: From the opening season—the Benedict Music Tent at night and during one of the opening concerts.

AT LEFT: Construction photos show some of Tent's massive anchors (bottom) and impressive infrastructure.

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AMFS STAFF (LEFT INSET); ALEX IRVIN (TOP & RIGHT)

After a year-long construction period, the 2,050-seat Benedict Music Tent, also designed by architect Harry Teague, opened during the 2000 season with Mahler’s Second Symphony, “Resurrection,” (the same work that will close this summer’s 70th anniversary season on Final Sunday, August 18). The design of the Festival's new primary performance facility has open sides and a curving roof made of Teflon-coated fiberglass—the same material used by the iconic Denver International Airport. In 2003, the AMFS and Aspen Country Day School began planning a joint campus that would allow both organizations to grow while efficiently sharing space.

2010s

ELLE LOGAN (BOTTOM); AMFS STAFF (CENTER); GRITTANI CREATIVE (TOP)

After a 10-year planning and construction process, the Aspen Music Festival and School completed the $75 million redevelopment of the 38-acre Matthew and Carolyn Bucksbaum Campus on Castle Creek Road.

TOP The Bucksbaum Campus today, looking toward (L-R) Hurst Hall, the Upper Studio Building, and the Robert Harth Building.

MIDDLE The Bucksbaum Campus under construction.

BOTTOM 2017 horn student Brianna Garcon plays on campus with the Robert Harth Building in the background.

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Today As the Aspen Music Festival and School enters its eighth decade, it is regarded as one of the top classical music festivals in the United States, drawing students, guest artists, and audiences from around the world. In 2018, a record 11 percent of AMFS students came from under-represented groups in classical music, exceeding any other summer classical music program or professional orchestra, and most year-round colleges and conservatories. With education at the heart of its mission, the AMFS continues to bring together the world’s most revered classical musicians and rising stars to make music come alive.

Perhaps alumna Sarah Chang put it best: “The AMFS is unlike any other festival. It has this way of seamlessly blending the artist and faculty and students into this wonderful tightknit circle where you are all one, and you’re part of a wonderful community.”

TOP Students celebrate after a performance in the Benedict Music Tent.

MIDDLE Violinist Midori with students backstage (L).

Students warm up on the Paepcke Terrace outside the Tent (R).

ELLE LOGAN

BOTTOM Biguo Xing, winner of the 2018 Piano Competition, performs with conductor Patrick Summers and the Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra.

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2020 WINTER MUSIC JANUARY–MARCH Join us in Harris Concert Hall for the 2020 Winter Music Recital Series. And don’t miss The Met: Live in HD at the Wheeler Opera House.

FEBRUARY 6

WILLIAM HAGEN violin and ALBERT CANO SMIT piano FEBRUARY 13

JOYCE YANG piano

TICKETS ON SALE IN AUGUST!

FEBRUARY 20

DAVID FINCKEL cello and WU HAN piano

970 925 9042 www.aspenmusicfestival.com

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COMPOSING

AMERICA What makes classical music American? Ask any number of people and you’re likely to get an equal number of different responses.

Even Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein, Lukas Foss, and Irving Fine—titans of twentieth-century American composition—couldn’t agree on a defining characteristic. In a boisterous roundtable discussion recorded in 1950,* their attempts to describe it ranged from “digested jazz,” Mixolydian mode, and “down notes” to a certain “unfussiness” or the “open air” quality (sometimes suggested by octave spacing) of works like Copland’s Billy the Kid to a sense of “freshness and naïveté,” drive and optimism, and sometimes even the pessimism of “the young composers” of the time.

Nearly sixty years earlier in 1892, Czech composer Antonin Dvořák had come to the United States to direct the National Conservatory of Music in New York.

Already well known for the compositions he based on the folk melodies of his native Bohemia (now part of the Czech Republic), Dvořák argued that an American school of composition should be based on African American spirituals, Native American melodies and America’s folk music. Inspired by those melodies, Dvořák’s Ninth Symphony, “From the New World” (July 10) became one of the most recognizable “American” works in the classical music cannon.

By the 1920s, America’s rapidly growing jazz tradition had become an important influence for Gershwin, a native New Yorker and son of Russian émigrés, but so was the city he called home. In a 1926 essay for Theatre Magazine titled “Jazz is the Voice of the American Soul,” he wrote that his music came from “old and new music, forgotten melodies and the craze of the moment, bits of opera, Russian folk songs, Spanish ballads, chansons, ragtime ditties combined in a mighty chorus in my inner ear.”

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CLAY MCBRIDE

By Kristin Cleveland

CHARLES ABBOTT

If anything, “a mighty—and ever-changing—chorus” might be a fairly accurate description of American classical music.

Alan Fletcher, a composer himself and president of the Aspen Music Festival and School, points out that American classical music has grown out of a wide range of influence and inspiration.

“America’s first great orchestras were made up almost entirely of émigré musicians,” he says. “Eastern European Jews who fled the pogroms brought us the Coplands and Gershwins, and brilliant émigrés who fled Fascism transformed American composition.”

Walt Whitman, whose literary works have been set to music by so many American composers, found inspiration in the “Italian Opera” he so loved.

Fletcher points out these European traditions combined with the American melodies that so fascinated Dvořák to form the development of ragtime and jazz, Broadway, American ballet, popular song, and the American tradition of classical music.

“American music made classical music a plurality,” says Asadour Santourian, the AMFS’s vice president for artistic administration and artistic advisor. Whereas European composers of previous eras followed clearly defined conventions in composition style and method, American classical music expanded the art form exponentially.

The map on the following pages offers a glimpse at the origins of the American composers whose works will be presented this summer at the Aspen Music Festival and School.

For example, one of the new works performed this year will be American trumpeter and composer Wynton Marsalis’s Concerto in D for Violin and Orchestra—composed for and performed

by Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti (Aug. 7). Classically trained as well as one of the nation’s premier jazz artists, Marsalis has continually worked

to expand the conversation about music. In an interview about the new concerto, he noted the relationship between the Anglo-Celtic and Afro-American music he drew upon. “One of the major roots of Afro-American music is Anglo-Celtic music— Scottish music, jigs, Irish music,” says Marsalis. “People who heard Negro spirituals in the nineteenth century always said they sounded like Irish music.”

Concert-goers will have the opportunity to hear seminal works such as Gershwin’s Catfish Row: Suite from Porgy and Bess (June 28); the James Sinclair arrangement of Charles Ives’ Three Places in New England (July 19); Samuel Barber’s Piano Concerto, op. 38; Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story Symphonic Dances (July 26); and Aaron Copland’s quintessential Appalachian Spring (Aug. 15).

Other works are by composers who draw inspiration from the American environmental landscape, such as John Luther Adams’ Sila: The Breath of the World (July 21); our frontier history— Missy Mazzoli’s Proving Up (July 30); American popular culture—John Adams’s Road Movies (Aug. 7); or American literature, such as Jake Heggie’s Suite from Moby-Dick (July 14).

Still other works reflect the composers’ unique American experience.

Returning composer Gabriela Lena Frank’s Three Latin American Dances (July 3) allude to her Peruvian heritage as well as the work of Bernstein, Bela Bartók, and Alberto Ginastera. There will be two works (July 31 and Aug. 15)

by Grammy-, Academy Award- and Pulitzer Prize-winning Italian American composer John Corigliano, whose father, John Paul Corigliano Sr., was the first U.S.-born concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic.

Jazz pianist Vijay Iyer’s Radhe Radhe: Rites of Holi (July 27) draws on his Indian and Tamil heritage in a cham-

OPPOSITE Wynton Marsalis ABOVE George Crumb in the Bayer-Benedict Tent

ber work inspired by India’s colorful celebration of spring and originally commissioned to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring (Aug. 4). And in the season-opening recital (June 27), The Pacifica Quartet performs Lyric for Strings

by George Theophilus Walker. In 1945 alone, he was the first African American pianist to play a recital at New York’s Town Hall, the first black instrumentalist to play a solo with the Philadelphia Orchestra, and the first black graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. In 1996 Walker became the first African American composer to win a Pulitzer Prize.

As the Aspen Music Festival and School explores the theme, Being American, these works and many others reflect and celebrate the sweeping diversity of American culture and its landscape, and the heritage and experiences of the musicians who created it. * “A Chorus of Conversation: What Is American Music?” Annotations: The NEH Preservation Project, NEH and WNYC, February 11, 2013, wnyc.org/ story/217199-what-american-music

Visit www.aspenmusicfestival.com/ events/calendar to discover when you can hear these and many more American classical works.

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A MAP OF AMERICAN COMPOSERS These are the American composers whose works are featured during the 2019 Season.

CONOR BROWN BOULDER | 1988 -

One of the youngest composers this season, Brown’s music is informed by the American West. He is a clarinetist with the Boulder Altitude Directive.

CONRAD TAO URBANA | 1994 -

Tao’s parents were born in China and earned degrees at Princeton. Tao did his undergraduate work at Juilliard and Columbia.

GABRIELA LENA FRANK BERKELEY | 1972 -

Inspired by her mother’s Peruvian/Chinese and father’s Lithuanian/ Jewish heritage Frank is “something of a musical anthropologist,” her work reflecting Latin American folklore and incorporating poetry, mythology and native music styles…”

Although not an American, Czech composer Antonin Dvořák was a champion of American music. In 1893, he spent a summer sabbatical in Spillville, Iowa, inspired by the state's rolling hills and the song of the red-winged blackbird, he composed his "American Quartet."

SERGEI RACHMANINOFF BIRTHPLACE Staraya, Russia 1873 - 1943

ARNOLD SCHOENBERG Vienna, Austria

BIRTHPLACE

1874-1951

IGOR STRAVINSKY BIRTHPLACE Russia 1882 - 1940

BIRTHPLACE

ANDRÉ PREVIN Berlin, Germany 1929 - 2019

Previn’s family left Nazi Germany when he was only 10. He spent the early part of his career composing and arranging Hollywood film scores.

DONALD CROCKETT PASADENA | 1951 -

CHRISTOPHER THEOFANIDIS DALLAS | 1967 -

AMFS alumni ÉMIGRÉ COMPOSERS US-BORN COMPOSERS US-BORN COMPOSERS FROM 1ST-GENERATION IMMIGRANT FAMILIES

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ALAN HOVHANESS SOMERVILLE | 1911 - 2000

ANDREW NORMAN SAMUEL BARBER

GRAND RAPIDS | 1979 -

WEST CHESTER 1910 - 1981

LUKAS FOSS

KATI AGÓCS WINDSOR, ONT | 1975 -

Alumna Kati Agócs was born in Canada to American and Hungarian parents, making her a citizen of Canada, Hungary, and the U.S.

Hovhaness found inspiration in the Armenian and Kurdish songs of his father’s native Turkey.

GEORGE ANTHEIL TRENTON | 1900 - 1959

LEONARD BERNSTEIN

JOHN HARBISON

BIRTHPLACE

ORANGE | 1938 -

PIERRE JALBERT

1922 - 2009

STEPHEN HARTKE

MANCHESTER 1967 -

Berlin, Germany DAVID AMRAM PHILADELPHIA | 1930 -

JULIA WOLFE PHILADELPHIA | 1956 -

MISSY MAZZOLI

ORANGE | 1952 -

ALAN FLETCHER RIVERSIDE | 1956 -

JASON ECKHARDT PRINCETON | 1971-

LAWRENCE | 1918 -1991

JOHN ADAMS WORCESTER | 1947 -

The 2019 Erasmus Prize jury praised Adams for making “contemporary classical music ‘communicate’ again."

JUDITH SHATIN BOSTON | 1949 -

LANSDALE | 1980 -

BÉLA BARTÓK Hungary (Romania)

PHILIP GLASS

BIRTHPLACE

BALTIMORE | 1930 -

1881 - 1945

Although Bartók kept an apartment in NYC, he composed several important works at a beloved rented cabin in Saranac Lake, NY.

VIJAY IYER ALBANY & FAIRPORT | 1971 -

GEORGE WALKER

Iyer’s parents are Tamil immigrants from India. His undergraduate degrees were in math and physics.

WASHINGTON, D.C. 1922 - 2018

CHARLES IVES DANBURY | 1874 - 1954

DAVID SAMPSON CHARLOTTESVILLE 1951 -

During the Civil War, Ives’ father was the youngest band leader in the Union Army.

GEORGE GERSHWIN EDGAR MEYER OAK RIDGE | 1960-

BROOKLYN | 1898 - 1937

AARON COPLAND BROOKLYN | 1900 - 1990

GEORGE CRUMB CHARLESTON | 1929 -

KURT WEILL Dessau, Germany

BIRTHPLACE

1900 - 1950

ELLIOTT CARTER NYC (MANHATTAN) | 1908 - 2011

GUNTHER SCHULLER QUEENS | 1925 - 2015

WYNTON MARSALIS PAULINE OLIVEROS HOUSTON | 1932 - 2016

NEW ORLEANS | 1961 -

JOHN LUTHER ADAMS

JOHN CORIGLIANO

MERIDIAN | 1953 -

Born and raised in the South and New York City, Adams’s Sila: Breath of the World was inspired by the Inuit culture of Alaska, where he lived for more than 40 years.

STEPHEN SONDHEIM NYC | 1930 -

JAKE HEGGIE WEST PALM BEACH 1961 -

NYC | 1938 -

AUGUSTA READ THOMAS GLEN COVE | 1964 -

TRISTAN PERICH NYC | 1982 -

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MUSIC & NATURE FIVE FAVORITE STUDENT HIKES IN AND AROUND ASPEN

By Talia Smith

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ELLE LOGAN

To many, Aspen is a retreat away from the hustle and bustle of the big city.

Solitude is easy to find nestled between mountains where you can see the Milky Way with the naked eye. The proximity to nature is especially helpful to students who flee metropolitan areas to study and perform at the Aspen Music Festival and School. The mountains and trails in Aspen provide more than just exercise and scenic views to AMFS students—they also offer inspiration and rejuvenation.

“I’m based in Manhattan, where you can see stars if you squint, but it’s certainly not a given,” says Conrad Tao, renowned pianist and AMFS alumnus. He often returns to Aspen as a guest artist. “To be in a place with such a capacity for natural openness is undoubtedly nourishing for my playing.”

Sydney Baedke, a 2018 Aspen Opera Center student says the Festival is about nurturing yourself along with your instrument, and the outdoors are a part of that process. “I find that having the opportunity to go on hikes and explore everything that Aspen and the surrounding area have to offer encourages you to make sure you’re taking care of your entire self,” says Baedke. “It’s really good to be somewhere you can have the chance to take a step back, gain some perspective, and then bring that to your performing.”

Some students find that Aspen’s natural setting helps them manage their workload at the Festival. Violin student Djumash Poulsen, who lives in London during the year, describes the intensity of playing five shows in one week. “If I were to do five concerts in a week in London, I would be very, very miserable because you don’t get peace and quiet there,” he says. “In Aspen, it is all easily accessible. You go outside, and you’re surrounded by mountains. Just going for a run is refreshing enough for me to take on the mental challenge of delivering five performances.”

William Walker, 2018 Aspen Conducting Academy student, says that Beethoven and Mahler would leave the city to go into nature to gain inspiration. Similarly, Walker says, TOP Sydney Baedke “Even though I’ve been busy going to rehears- BOTTOM William Walker als every single day, I still feel that being in this environment—as opposed to a big city—has been really relaxing and refreshing; it’s kept the batteries going.”

Martin Pratissoli as a 2018 cello student originally from Bolzano, Italy. He points out that, like Aspen, many music festivals in Europe take place in the mountains. “Being outside of the place you live during the year is something that is positive for art and music,” he explains. Pratissoli, who grew up in the Alps, says he feels at home in Aspen. “To be here in the mountains, in this beautiful place, helps me to make a normal life and to relax after rehearsals.”

“There is music to be found in our relationship to nature, if we care to listen for it and make it so,” says Tao. “When I’m performing in the Tent, there’s no possibility of it being a hermetic experience. Dogs on the lawn, families picnicking, hail terrifyingly making itself known on the roof—it’s all a part of the show.”

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LOOKING FOR AN INSPIRING HIKE IN ASPEN? THESE ARE SOME AMFS STUDENT FAVORITES.

MAROON BELLS The Maroon Bells are the payoff for the quintessential, not-to-be-missed hike in Aspen. With trails for every experience level, the "Bells" are framed beautifully by a valley with a lake in the forefront. Due to the large number of visitors, the Bells can be reached only by bus between 8 am and 5 pm. Outside of those hours, cars are allowed to drive up to the parking lot.

HOW TO GET THERE Either take the bus or drive to the Aspen Highlands parking lot, about 1.5 miles from the roundabout up Maroon Creek Road. At the Aspen Highlands ski shop, purchase an $8 round-trip bus ticket and wait for a bus to take you the rest of the way. Buses run every 20 minutes. During the 20-minute ride, the driver will share fun facts and history about the area. The 3.5-mile Crater Lake Trail is a fan favorite.

HUNTER CREEK The Hunter Creek Trail is a scenic and relatively flat hike that you can make as long or as short as you wish. It offers cool shade under the Aspen trees, bridges over running rivers, and peeks of the town.

our relationship to nature, if we care to listen for it and make it so.”

- CONRAD TAO

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HOW TO GET THERE By car, drive north on Mill Street and bear left onto Red Mountain Road. Take the next right onto Lone Pine Road and you’ll find the trailhead on the left. Street parking is available. Or, take the Hunter Creek Bus, which stops right across the street from the trailhead.

ELLE LOGAN

“There is music to be found in

SMUGGLER MOUNTAIN This moderate hike has open and clear views of Aspen all the way up. At the top, you’ll find a canopy of Aspen trees and a wooden observation deck where you can take in the scenery. The trail is plenty wide for dogs, mountain bikes, and groups of friends. The Smuggler Mountain Overlook is 1.5 miles up, but the trail continues on for another six miles.

HOW TO GET THERE Traveling east on Main Street in Aspen, turn left onto Mill Street. Travel a quarter-mile and turn right after the bridge onto Gibson Avenue. Follow Gibson an eighth of a mile to a Y intersection and bear left onto South Avenue, followed by a quick right onto Park Circle. Follow Park Circle for an eighth of a mile to Smuggler Mountain Road and turn left. There is parking on the right.

SPIRAL POINT VIA THE RIM TRAIL Spiral Point, also known as the Yin Yang Trail, offers a moderate hike with a unique and meditative end. After winding one mile up—at times through wildflowers—the hiker’s reward at the top of Spiral Point is a stone platform with an inlaid yin yang symbol at the center.

The breathtaking panoramic views overlook mountain ranges, Ziegler Reservoir (site of the 2010 discovery of thousands of fossilized bones of fifty-two Ice Age species, including mammoths and mastodons), and the Village of Snowmass.

HOW TO GET THERE By car, take Brush Creek Road in Snowmass, bear right onto Divide Road and park on left side. Cross the street and look for Rim Trail South signs. By bus, from the Brush Creek Station on Hwy. 82, take the local Snowmass Bus nine stops and get off at the Creekside stop.

Follow Divide Road up the hill just beyond Deerfield Drive, where you’ll find Rim Trail South signs and the trail on the right.

UTE TRAIL/ ASPEN MOUNTAIN

GRITTANI CREATIVE

The rigorous, one-mile Ute Trail will take you to the Ute Rock Overlook, where you can look down on the entire city of Aspen. From there, the trail continues up Aspen Mountain for another two steep miles where you’ll reach the top of the gondola and a vista from 11,212 feet of elevation. On Saturdays, Music on the Mountain, a free concert featuring AMFS students, takes place at 1 pm in the amphitheater.

Bonus: If you can hike to the top, the gondola ride down is free!

HOW TO GET THERE From downtown Aspen, the trailhead is 0.4 miles down Ute Avenue. Parking is on the left and the trail begins across the street.

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ABRIDGED CALENDAR 2019 ASPEN MUSIC FESTIVAL AND SCHOOL 70TH ANNIVERSARY SEASON JUNE 27–AUGUST 21, 2019

The Aspen Music Festival and School offers up to fifteen events each day—many of them free—including concerts, operas, chamber music, artist-faculty and student recitals, lectures, family events, public master classes, guided tours, and more. For a complete listing of events, visit www.aspenmusicfestival.com or pick up a weekly printed schedule available at hotels and visitor centers around Aspen.

MONDAY | JULY 1

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 6 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

TUESDAY | JULY 2 Artist-faculty Bing Wang and violin student Mark Chien.

THURSDAY | JUNE 27

SATURDAY | JUNE 29

A Recital by the Pacifica Quartet Harris Concert Hall 7 pm, $60 Featuring works by Walker, Shostakovich, and Beethoven.

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House 10 am, $40 Edward Berkeley director

FRIDAY | JUNE 28

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $82 Ludovic Morlot conductor, Andreas Haefliger piano EDGAR MEYER: New Piece for Orchestra MOZART: Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor, K. 491 — IVES/SINCLAIR: Washington’s Birthday from A Symphony: New England Holidays GERSHWIN: Catfish Row: Suite from Porgy and Bess

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Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

Gregory Porter’s Tribute to Nat “King” Cole, with Special Guests Benedict Music Tent 8 pm, $60, $90, $375 with dinner Presented in association with Jazz Aspen Snowmass

Harris Concert Hall Master Class Harris Concert Hall 1 pm, $25 David Finckel cello, Wu Han piano Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, free Featuring works by Wagner, Mozart, and Brahms.

A Recital by Conrad Tao piano Harris Concert Hall 7:30 pm, $65 Featuring works by Jason Eckardt, Beethoven, and Schumann.

WEDNESDAY | JULY 3

SUNDAY | JUNE 30

High Notes Panel Discussion Paepcke Auditorium 12 pm, free Speakers: Alan Fletcher, Joyce Yang, Simone Porter

Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $85 Robert Spano conductor, Joyce Yang piano

Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $25 Patrick Summers conductor, Maya Anjali Buchanan violin

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Featuring works by Gabriela Lena Frank, Glazunov, Tchaikovsky.

A Recital by Joyce Yang piano Harris Concert Hall 8:30 pm, $60 Featuring works by Mozart, Carl Vine, and Rachmaninoff.

THURSDAY | JULY 4

Fourth of July Concert Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, free The annual free Fourth of July celebration brings the AMFS band to the Tent stage with stirring patriotic favorites.

FRIDAY | JULY 5

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $82 Nicholas McGegan conductor, Simone Porter violin, Tamás Pálfalvi flugelhorn, Stuart Stephenson flugelhorn HOLST: Walt Whitman Overture, op. 7 PROKOFIEV: Violin Concerto No. 1 in D major, op. 19 — VIVALDI: Concerto in G Minor, RV 531 SCHUBERT: Symphony No. 5 in B-flat major, D. 485 SATURDAY | JULY 6

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House 10 am, $40 Edward Berkeley director Music on the Mountain Top of Aspen Mountain (gondola ticket or hike required) 1 pm, free

ELLE LOGAN

GERSHWIN: Piano Concerto in F major — RACHMANINOFF: Symphony No. 3 in A minor, op. 44

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

A Recital by Paul Huang violin, David Finckel cello, and Wu Han piano Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $65 Featuring works by Beethoven, Saint-Saëns, and Tchaikovsky.

SUNDAY | JULY 7

Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $90 Joshua Weilerstein conductor, Yefim Bronfman piano AUGUSTA READ THOMAS: Brio BRAHMS: Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, op. 15 — SIBELIUS: Symphony No. 5 in E-flat major, op. 82 MONDAY | JULY 8

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 6 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

TUESDAY | JULY 9

Harris Concert Hall Master Class Harris Concert Hall 1 pm, $25 David Kim violin Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, free Featuring works by R. Strauss, Sibelius, and Bartók.

Music with a View Aspen Art Museum 6 pm, free A Recital by Kristóf Baráti violin and Anton Nel piano Harris Concert Hall 7:30 pm, $55 Featuring works by J.S. BACH, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Ysaÿe, and Ravel.

WEDNESDAY | JULY 10

High Notes Panel Discussion Paepcke Auditorium 12 pm, free Speakers: Alan Fletcher, Jory Vinikour, Tamás Pálfalvi Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $25 Ludovic Morlot conductor, Piano Competition Winner Featuring works by Copland, Mozart, and Dvořák.

Brandenburg Recital I Harris Concert Hall 8:30 pm, $50, $85 Jory Vinikour conductor and harpsichord, Fabiola Kim violin, Chad Hoopes violin, Paul Huang violin, Blake Pouliot violin, Angelo Xiang Yu violin, Matthew Lipman viola, Timothy Ridout viola, Nadine Asin flute, Elaine Douvas oboe, John Zirbel french horn Featuring Bach’s beloved Brandenburg Concertos.

THURSDAY | JULY 11

Sondheim’s A Little Night Music Wheeler Opera House 7 pm, $75, $50, $25 obstructed Andy Einhorn conductor, Edward Berkeley director Brandenburg Recital II Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $85, $50 Jory Vinikour conductor and harpsichord, Fabiola Kim violin, Chad Hoopes violin, Paul Huang violin, Blake Pouliot violin, Angelo Xiang Yu violin, Matthew Lipman viola, Timothy Ridout viola, Nadine Asin flute, Elaine Douvas oboe, Tamás Pálfalvi corno da caccia Featuring Bach’s beloved Brandenburg Concertos.

FRIDAY | JULY 12

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $82 Robert Spano conductor, Stuart Stephenson trumpet, Stefan Jackiw violin

HOVHANESS: Prayer of St. Gregory, op 62b BARBER: Violin Concerto, op. 14 — SCHUMANN: Symphony No. 1 in B-flat major, op. 38, “Spring” SATURDAY | JULY 13

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House 10 am, $40 Edward Berkeley director, Aspen Opera Center artistfaculty Music on the Mountain Top of Aspen Mountain (gondola ticket or hike required) 1 pm, free Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

Sondheim’s A Little Night Music Wheeler Opera House 7 pm, $75, $50, $25 obstructed Andy Einhorn conductor, Edward Berkeley director A Recital by George Li piano Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $55 Featuring works by Beethoven and Schumann.

SUNDAY | JULY 14

Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $85 Cristian Măcelaru conductor, Esther Yoo violin SCHULLER: from Seven Studies on Themes of Paul Klee TCHAIKOVSKY: Violin Concerto in D major, op. 35 — JAKE HEGGIE/CRISTIAN MĂCELARU: Suite from Moby-Dick COPLAND: Four Dance Episodes from Rodeo

MONDAY | JULY 15

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 6 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

Sondheim’s A Little Night Music Wheeler Opera House 8 pm, $75, $50, $25 obstructed Andy Einhorn conductor, Edward Berkeley director TUESDAY | JULY 16

Harris Concert Hall Master Class Harris Concert Hall 1 pm, $25 Pacifica Quartet Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, free Winners of the Oboe, Clarinet, Bassoon, and Horn Competitions Music with a View Aspen Art Museum 6 pm, free A Recital by Stephen Hough piano Harris Concert Hall 7:30 pm, $60 Featuring works by J.S. Bach, Busoni, Chopin, and Liszt.

WEDNESDAY | JULY 17

High Notes Panel Discussion Paepcke Auditorium 12 pm, free Speakers: Alan Fletcher, Anton Nel, Anneleen Lenaerts, SeongJin Cho Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $25 Johannes Zahn conductor, Darrett Adkins cello Featuring works by Stephen Hartke and Brahms.

A Recital by the American Brass Quintet Harris Concert Hall 8:30 pm, $55

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THURSDAY | JULY 18

Red, Hot, and Blue: A Cabaret Evening from American Song to Broadway Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $55 Singers of the Aspen Opera Center FRIDAY | JULY 19

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $82 Courtney Lewis conductor, Jory Vinikour harpsichord, Anneleen Lenaerts harp, Anton Nel piano IVES: The Unanswered Question MARTIN: Petite symphonie concertante — BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 2 in D major, op. 36 SATURDAY | JULY 20

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House 10 am, $40 Edward Berkeley director, Aspen Opera Center artistfaculty Music on the Mountain Top of Aspen Mountain (gondola ride or hike required) 1 pm, free Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

A Recital by Arie Vardi piano Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $60 Maxim Lando piano, Ray Ushikubo piano, Harmony Zhu piano Featuring works by J.S. Bach.

SUNDAY | JULY 21

Sila: The Breath of the World David Karetsky Music Lawn 2 pm, free Timothy Weiss conductor Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $85 Leonard Slatkin conductor,

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Seong-Jin Cho piano CONOR ABBOTT BROWN: How to Relax with Origami RACHMANINOFF: Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, op. 18 — ELGAR: Variations on an Original Theme, op. 36, “Enigma” MONDAY | JULY 22

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 6 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific: In Concert Benedict Music Tent 7:30 pm, $50, $95, $500 with party Lonny Price director, Andy Einhorn conductor, Festival Symphony Presented in association with Theatre Aspen TUESDAY | JULY 23

Harris Concert Hall Master Class Harris Concert Hall 1 pm, $25 Inon Barnatan piano Music with a View Aspen Art Museum 6 pm, free A Recital by Sarah Chang violin Harris Concert Hall 7:30 pm, $85, $50 Johannes Zahn conductor Program to include: DVOŘÁK: Romance for Violin and Orchestra in F minor, op.

11, B. 39 BARTÓK/MAX MUELLER: Romanian Folk Dances, BB 76 RAVEL: Tzigane, rapsodie de concert WEDNESDAY | JULY 24

High Notes Panel Discussion Paepcke Auditorium 12 pm, free Speakers: Alan Fletcher, Alisa Weilerstein, Inon Barnatan, Sergey Khachatryan, Colin Currie

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Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $25 Scott Terrill conductor, William Hagen violin, Andrei Ioniţă cello Featuring works by Brahms and Prokofiev.

A Recital by the American String Quartet Harris Concert Hall 8:30 pm, $65 Anton Nel piano Featuring works by Dvořák, Vivian Fung, and Franck.

THURSDAY | JULY 25

A Recital by Sergey Khachatryan violin, Alisa Weilerstein cello, Inon Barnatan piano, and Colin Currie percussion Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $65 Featuring works by Beethoven, Rolf Wallin, Schoenberg, and Shostakovich.

A Recital by Jeremy Denk piano Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $65 Featuring works by J.S. Bach, Ligeti, Liszt, Berg, and Schumann.

SUNDAY | JULY 28

Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $85 Robert Spano conductor, Alisa Weilerstein cello BARBER: Cello Concerto, op. 22 — MAHLER: Symphony No. 7 in E minor MONDAY | JULY 29

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 6 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

FRIDAY | JULY 26

TUESDAY | JULY 30

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $82 Alondra de la Parra conductor, Inon Barnatan piano ARTURO MÁRQUEZ: Danzón No. 2 BARBER: Piano Concerto, op. 38 — BERNSTEIN: West Side Story Symphonic Dances

Master Class with Renée Fleming Harris Concert Hall 1 pm, $40

SATURDAY | JULY 27

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House 10 am, $40 Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra, Robert Spano conductor, Edward Berkeley director Music on the Mountain Top of Aspen Mountain (gondola ride or hike required) 1 pm, free Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, free Brass Concerto Competition Winner Featuring works by Mozart and Debussy.

Music with a View Aspen Art Museum 6 pm, free Missy Mazzoli’s Proving Up Harris Concert Hall 7:30 pm, $40 Scott Terrell conductor, Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, Shayleen Norat soprano, Sydney Baedke soprano, Eric J. McConnell bass, Mary Duncan Steidl director WEDNESDAY | JULY 31

High Notes Panel Discussion Paepcke Auditorium 12 pm, free Speakers: Alan Fletcher, Escher String Quartet

The Benedict Music Tent.

Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $25 Stephen Mulligan conductor, Jeffrey Kahane piano Featuring works by Mozart and Sibelius.

A Recital by Daniil Trifonov piano Harris Concert Hall 8:30 pm, $75 Featuring works by Berg, Prokofiev, Bartók, Copland, Messiaen, Ligeti, Stockhausen, John Adams, John Corigliano, and Thomas Adès.

THURSDAY | AUGUST 1

GRITTANI CREATIVE

A Recital by the Emerson String Quartet and Renée Fleming soprano Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $85, $50 Featuring works by Haydn, Barber, and André Previn.

FRIDAY | AUGUST 2

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $82 Markus Stenz conductor, Sergey Khachatryan violin,

CHABRIER: España, rhapsody KHATCHATURIAN: Violin Concerto — BARTÓK: Dance Suite, BB 86a BIZET: Carmen Suite SATURDAY | AUGUST 3

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House 10 am, $40 Renée Fleming soprano, Patrick Summers conductor, Edward Berkeley director, Aspen Opera Center artist-faculty, Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra Music on the Mountain Top of Aspen Mountain (gondola ride or hike required) 1 pm, free Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

A Recital by the Escher String Quartet Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $55 Featuring works by Mozart, Andrew Norman, and Schubert.

SUNDAY | AUGUST 4

Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $90 James Gaffigan conductor, Nikolai Lugansky piano ANNA THORVALDSDOTTIR: Aeriality RACHMANINOFF: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, op. 43 — STRAVINSKY: The Rite of Spring MONDAY | AUGUST 5

Season Benefit: An American Feast of Music Hurst Hall, Bucksbaum Campus 6 pm For more information and to purchase tickets, contact Darian Oliva at 970 205 5063.

TUESDAY | AUGUST 6

Harris Concert Hall Master Class Harris Concert Hall 1 pm, $25 Augustin Hadelich violin Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra Benedict Music Tent

4 pm, free James Gaffigan conductor, Robert Spano conductor, Low Strings Concerto Competition Winner Featuring works by Esa-Pekka Salonen and Beethoven.

Music with a View Aspen Art Museum 6 pm, free A Recital by Nikolai Lugansky piano Harris Concert Hall 7:30 pm, $65 Featuring works by Franck, Debussy, and Skryabin.

WEDNESDAY | AUGUST 7

Hight Notes Panel Discussion Paepcke Auditorium 12 pm, free Speakers: Alan Fletcher, Midori, Christopher Theofanidis Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $25 Robert Spano conductor, Nicola Benedetti violin Featuring works by Wynton Marsalis and Copland.

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A Recital by Augustin Hadelich violin and Orion Weiss piano Harris Concert Hall 8:30 pm, $85, $50 Featuring works by Beethoven, Debussy, Ysaÿe, Brahms, and John Adams.

SUNDAY | AUGUST 11

A Recital by Simone Dinnerstein piano Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $65 Featuring works by Couperin, Schumann, Philip Glass, and Satie.

Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $85 Michael Stern conductor, The Percussion Collective, Jan Lisiecki piano GERSHWIN: Cuban Overture CHRISTOPHER THEOFANIDIS: Drum Circles — MENDELSSOHN: Piano Concerto No. 1 in G minor, op. 25 BARTÓK: The Miraculous Mandarin Suite, BB 82, op. 19

FRIDAY | AUGUST 9

MONDAY | AUGUST 12

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $90 Erik Nielsen conductor, Midori violin, Elaine Douvas oboe, Nancy Allen harp SCHUMANN: Violin Concerto in D minor — MARTIN: Three Dances for Oboe, Harp, and Strings MOZART: Symphony No. 39 in E-flat major, K. 543

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 6 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

SATURDAY | AUGUST 10

Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, free Featuring works by Bartók and Tchaikovsky.

THURSDAY | AUGUST 8

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House 10 am, $40 Edward Berkeley director, Aspen Opera Center artistfaculty Music on the Mountain Top of Aspen Mountain (gondola ride or hike required) 1 pm, free Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

A Recital by Sharon Isbin guitar, Jessica Rivera soprano, and Brinton Smith cello Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $75 Featuring works by Britten, Danielpour, Rodrigo, VillaLobos/Barabosa-Lima, Montsalvatge, and more.

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TUESDAY | AUGUST 13

Harris Concert Hall Master Class Harris Concert Hall 1 pm, $25 Robert McDuffie violin

Music with a View Aspen Art Museum 6 pm, free Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro Wheeler Opera House 7 pm, $75, $25 obstructed Jane Glover conductor, Edward Berkeley director A Recital by the JCT Trio Harris Concert Hall 7:30 pm, $60 Stefan Jackiw violin, Jay Campbell cello, Conrad Tao piano Featuring works by Conrad Tao and Beethoven.

WEDNESDAY | AUGUST 14

High Notes Panel Discussion Paepcke Auditorium 12 pm, free

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Speakers: Alan Fletcher, Jonathan Biss piano, Mane Galoyan soprano, Kelley O’Connor mezzo-soprano

10 am, $40 Edward Berkeley director, Aspen Opera Center artistfaculty

Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $25 Hugh Wolff conductor, Violin Competition Winner Featuring works by Nicky Sohn, Mozart, and Rachmaninoff.

Chamber Music Harris Concert Hall 4:30 pm, $45 Chamber music gems played by the AMFS’s brilliant artistfaculty.

A Recital by Jay Campbell cello Harris Concert Hall 8:30 pm, $55 Featuring works by Matthias Pintscher, Carter, Liza Lim, Oliveros, J.S. Bach, and Tristan Perich.

THURSDAY | AUGUST 15

Family Concert Harris Concert Hall 5 pm, free Johannes Zahn conductor Featuring Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf.

Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro Wheeler Opera House 7 pm, $75, $25 obstructed Jane Glover conductor, Edward Berkeley director A Recital by Robert McDuffie violin Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $85, $50 Robert McDuffie violin, Robert Spano piano Featuring works by Gershwin, John Corigliano, and Copland’s Appalachian Spring.

FRIDAY | AUGUST 16

Aspen Chamber Symphony Benedict Music Tent 6 pm, $82 Christian Arming conductor, Jonathan Biss piano BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, op. 37 — ALAN FLETCHER: If on a winter’s night a traveler BRAHMS: Variations on a Theme by Haydn, op. 56a SATURDAY | AUGUST 17

Opera Scenes Master Class Wheeler Opera House

Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro Wheeler Opera House 7 pm, $75, $25 obstructed Jane Glover conductor, Edward Berkeley director A Recital by Vladimir Feltsman piano Harris Concert Hall 8 pm, $75 Featuring works by Beethoven and Chopin.

SUNDAY | AUGUST 18

Aspen Festival Orchestra Benedict Music Tent 4 pm, $90 Robert Spano conductor, Seraphic Fire, Mane Galoyan soprano, Kelley O’Connor mezzo-soprano, Colorado Symphony Orchestra Chorus, Duain Wolfe chorus director, Seraphic Fire Professional Choral Institute Singers J.S. BACH: Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit, BWV 106, “Actus tragicus” — MAHLER: Symphony No. 2 in C minor, “Resurrection” TUESDAY | AUGUST 20

Country Music: An Evening with Ken Burns Harris Concert Hall 5:30 pm, $200 Speakers: Ken Burns, Alan Fletcher, Edgar Meyer WEDNESDAY | AUGUST 21

A Recital by the Seraphic Fire Professional Choral Institute Harris Concert Hall 7 pm, $25 Featuring choral works by Jake Runestad, Jeffrey Van, Billings, and Morten Lauridsen.

FACULTY FOCUS LEADERSHIP IN MUSIC

ELLE LOGAN

By Kristin Cleveland

In the classical music world, probably the most iconic symbol of leadership is the figure of a conductor with baton in hand.

However Nicholas McGegan, long-time guest conductor at the Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS) and one of the world’s leading Baroque conductors and eighteenth-century music experts, dispels any notion about the power of the baton when it comes to leadership. “A lot of conductors think that conducting is about waving a little stick about in fancy ways. I don’t even use one,” he points out. “Being a conductor—and a leader—is about knowing how to communicate.”

Impromptu talked with McGegan and AMFS artistfaculty member Brinton Averil Smith to explore their insights on the leadership skills that the study and practice of music can teach: Which are most important in practice, in rehearsal, and in performance? And which are the most difficult to master?

A flutist and harpsichordist, McGegan was educa­ ted in Cambridge and Oxford. For the past thirtyfour years he served as music director of San F­ rancisco’s

TOP Nicholas McGegan conducting the Aspen Chamber Symphony in 2018.

RIGHT Brinton Smith warming up with 2018 AMFS student Matthias Balzat.

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“Great musicians must always have the hunger to learn and improve.

I quickly learned that if I abandoned a pretense of authority and just tried to sincerely learn from the experience around me, I became more of a leader than I ever could have been by trying to impose my will.”

TOP Nicholas McGegan backstage with the 2018 students of the Aspen Conducting Academy.

BOTTOM Brinton Smith performing with fellow AMFS alumna Condoleezza Rice at the 2018 AMFS Season Benefit.

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ALEX IRVIN (BOTTOM) | ELLE LOGAN (TOP)

Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra and Chorale, completing his tenure with the 2019–20 season. He’s been a guest conductor at the AMFS nearly every year over the past twenty.

Smith first earned a math degree at age seventeen before deciding to pursue music. He spent five summers at the AMFS where he met cellist Zara Nelsova and went on to study with her at Juilliard, earning his master’s and doctoral degrees. He’s now the principal cellist and a regular soloist with the Houston Symphony and faculty member at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, and previously was a member of the New York Philharmonic and principal cellist of the San Diego and Fort Worth symphonies.

Both McGegan and Smith emphasize communication and listening, especially, among the important leadership skills that music study can teach, along with bravery and risk-taking, openness and flexibility, and humility.

When he describes the study of music, he talks about the progression from an inward focus out. “When we begin, we’re naturally completely focused on what we’re doing,” says Smith. “At first,

we’re trying to learn the mechanics of moving our bodies the right way to produce the correct sounds. Then we involve the mind more as we begin to play specific sounds in a specific order and rhythm in order to play a piece.

Eventually we begin to play with others and have to learn how to make our voice into one part of a whole.

“At each step of the learning process in music—which really never ends—our perspective continues to broaden,” he says. “Ultimately we all work together because we love the music more than we love our own egos. Shostakovich once told Rostropovich, ‘In music, there are no generals. We are all foot soldiers.’

Music is like an x-ray of the soul. Musicians who believe in themselves more than they believe in the music they play are easy to spot. Musicians who seek always to become better musicians for the sake of the music are cherished.”

“In teaching I try to convey that same philosophy,” he says. “Music is about so many different skills. You must be able to be your own brutal critic in the practice room, yet when the moment comes to walk onstage, you must have unbelievable faith in yourself and in your mission to communicate something more important than yourself to the audience.”

It’s when bringing musicians together in a teaching or performance setting, that the skills of communication and openness, as well as bravery and humility, really come into play.

McGegan says that communicating with empathy and clarity is crucial. “If you’re an intimidating teacher,” he says, “you’re never going to elicit a response from the student. Part of my leadership role is to teach the baby birds to fly.

They’re all . . . cowering on the branch, and I have to say, ‘Just take a risk, just flap your wings and see what happens.’”

To encourage that, McGegan always says two things in a rehearsal: “Please, always ask questions.” And, “If you’re going to make a mistake, please, make it passionately.”

“In music there is no shame in not knowing something,” Smith points out. “We all travel the same journey from ignorance to knowledge and—we hope—wisdom. But great musicians must always have the hunger to learn and improve. I quickly learned that if I abandoned a pretense of authority and just tried to sincerely learn from the experience around me, I became more of a leader than I ever could have been by trying to impose my will.”

Being open to, and learning from, the experience around you is another crucial ability because experience is the one skill that can’t be taught.

“Being a young conductor is one of the toughest jobs, and sadly, being a young female conductor is probably the toughest job,” says McGegan.

“You’re coming into an orchestra—let’s say you’re 25—where most of [the musicians] are over 50, and you’re trying to tell them what to do. They’ve had twice as much experience as you have, and there are some male members of orchestras who simply won’t take it from ‘a girl.’ Every year in the [Aspen Conducting Academy] class, we have two, three, four, five women, and they really have to be brave.”

Looking at it from the perspective of an orchestra principal, Smith recalls the first time he tried to lead a section. “I was actually a student in Aspen,” he says. “The lesson I quickly learned was that authority doesn’t come from a chair or a title; it can only come from respect—respect based not on abilities or talent, but on your integrity in pursuit of common musical goals.” He adds that it was a lesson that served him well when he started his first job as principal cellist leading a section of “far more experienced players.”

Being open to the music itself and pursuing common musical goals can be one of the most exciting aspects of studying because the participants are a part of a living, breathing process of creation and change.

McGegan admits that from conduc-

tor’s perspective, making great music is often about experimentation with a lot of listening skills thrown in. “Conducting is a bit like being a test chef,” he says. “You could say, ‘This is fine, but it doesn’t have enough salt,’ or ‘It doesn’t have quite enough oregano.’ As a conductor, you’ve got the basics and you’ve got the recipe—what the composer wrote on the page—but you’ve got to take it from the page to the audience.”

He adds that it’s not just the music, or what a conductor might want out of it that play into that transformation. “It’s the personalities of the people playing it who contribute to every single performance, and, let’s face it, the audience too,” he emphasizes. “Sometimes, the most exciting new things actually happen in a concert. . . . It takes a certain bravery to go out and make something up in front of an audience, and especially one in Aspen, which is about the smartest audience on the planet.”

Smith points out, “The ultimate goal of music is really to lose yourself so that the music and the instrument speak freely without self-consciousness and, in doing so, become part of a truth greater than your own world. The most profound moments you experience as a musician are the ones where you are the least aware of yourself and are just carried by the music.”

“My teacher, Zara Nelsova, taught us that music did not exist for us, but that we must exist for music. . . . If you think only of your part, if you long only for the moments in which you are in the spotlight, then not only will you miss the chance to be inspired by others, but you will miss the profound joy of being a part of something larger than yourself.

Respect from audiences and from colleagues is earned in music—much as in life—from honesty, integrity, and the desire to learn and always do better.

The struggle is endless, and endlessly joyful. As Rachmaninoff said, ‘A lifetime is not enough for music, but music is enough for a lifetime.’”

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STUDENT SPOTLIGHT Each year, more than 600 elite young musicians make their way to Aspen for an unparalleled summer of music education and performance. Get to know AMFS harp fellow Adam Phan, one of this season’s exceptional talents, before seeing him take the Benedict Music Tent stage this summer.

Adam Phan tried several different instruments before eventually finding his way to the harp. His father—a composer, pianist, and guitarist—started Phan on the piano at age four. Then his mother wanted him to play the cello, so he learned that, and then violin, viola, and trumpet all before the age of ten. Around this time, he saw a performance of the Ginastera Harp Concerto and knew he needed to get his hands on a harp.

“I think the harp was the first instrument that I chose on my own that I wanted to play,” he remembers. But it was the sound that really drew him in, “the thing I like most is that you can create many different sounds and textures with the harp, like playing different parts of the strings or using your fingernails.”

Home schooled in Dallas, Texas, twenty-one-year-old Phan now attends The Juilliard School in New York. This is Phan’s third summer at the Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS) where he studies with Nancy Allen, who is his teacher at Juilliard, Sivan Magen, and Anneleen Lenaerts. During his first summer, Phan won the Aspen Harp Competition and got to perform Carlos Salzédo’s Ballade as a soloist.

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Studying away from the pressures of school was one of the reasons Phan chose to come back this summer. “I think the opportunity to study with my teacher over the summer in a completely different environment is really nice,” says Phan. The AMFS community was another reason. He remembers his first two summers and the people he’s met fondly, especially the other harpists.

“At most music festivals, it’s only you by yourself as a harpist or there’s one other person. But Aspen’s so big, it has a bunch of different orchestras and opportunities. There are seven harpists in the studio. We’ve all really gotten to know each other.”

As a harp fellow, he rotates between playing with the Aspen Festival Orchestra and Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra, but has also had the opportunity to work with the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble in previous summers.

“I don’t usually do modern music a lot,” says Phan, “coming here, I get to experience edgier stuff.”

Throughout his musical career, Phan says there is one piece of advice that has really stuck with him, “There was a very big moment when I first came out to Nancy [Allen] at school. What she

said was very inspirational, she was like, ‘as artists, our job is to love and spread love in what we do. Nothing else matters, including what’s going on in the world or what’s going on with yourself.

If you can spread love through your creativity, that’s all you need to do as a musician.’”

When looking to the future, Phan is reminded of where he came from.

His parents immigrated to the United States from Vietnam in the 1960s, “they kind of lost touch with their roots a bit so they raised me to be really proud of my culture and my heritage. I would love to go back to Vietnam where I’m from and start a bigger classical music appreciation scene there.”

It’s something that Phan and his father have talked about doing, “I grew up in a financial situation where I didn’t have a lot of opportunities to take many lessons. Whenever I talk to my family [in Vietnam], they don’t understand the concept of me going to school for music and I want to change that. I want to give people an opportunity to do more than just the norm.” Encouraging others to pursue music and the arts, “that would be a long-time goal for me, as well as making money and having a job,” he laughs.

ELLE LOGAN

By Christina Thomsen

DON’T MISS SPECTACULAR

OPERA THIS SUMMER!

FULLY STAGED OPERAS

Stephen Sondheim’s A Little Night Music JULY 11, 13, 15 WHEELER OPERA HOUSE CONDUCTED BY ANDY EINHORN DIRECTED BY EDWARD BERKELEY Winner of four Tony Awards, this beloved Sondheim classic about love, regret, and desire unfolds amidst a tangled web of affairs during a weekend in the countryside. Both hilarious and heartbreaking, this dramatic celebration of love showcases timeless melodies, a harmonically advanced score—and Sondheim’s enduring genius.

Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro AUGUST 13, 15, 17 WHEELER OPERA HOUSE CONDUCTED BY JANE GLOVER DIRECTED BY EDWARD BERKELEY Widely considered one of the greatest operas ever written, The Marriage of Figaro is a fast-paced comedy that recounts a single day of scheming in pursuit of love—and lust—in the palace of Count Almaviva. Figaro pursues marriage to his beloved Susanna while the Count has designs on her as well.

Full of witty manipulations and resonant melodies, this artistic masterpiece makes us laugh, but also reveals the depths of human tenderness.

CONCERT PERFORMANCE

Missy Mazzoli’s Proving Up* JULY 30 | HARRIS CONCERT HALL CONDUCTED BY SCOTT TERRELL Recently premiered and highly acclaimed, this chamber opera is set on the 1860s frontier where families struggle for survival in pursuit of their American Dream. Drenched in passion, hope, and heartbreak, it achingly explores the “sincere values . . . and extraordinary costs” of this hardscrabble life.

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*Open to passholders

For more information, see the abridged calendar on page 34 or visit www.aspenmusicfestival.com.

ABOVE THE ASPEN OPERA CENTER'S 2018 PRODUCTION OF ROSSINI’S THE BARBER OF SEVILLE.

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www.aspenmusicfestival.com 970 925 9042