Tanglewood Music Center Director Ellen Highstein this week announced highlights of the Boston Symphony Orchestra's plans for the TMC's 2003 season.
Highlights include the world premieres of two new operas commissioned by the BSO from recent TMC alumni Osvaldo Golijov and Robert Zuidam, a groundbreaking collaboration with the Mark Morris Dance Group and cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and American conductor Robert Spano's first season as director of the TMC's annual Festival of Contemporary Music, to be held this year from July 17-21
Two World Premiere Operas
On August 10 and 11, the Tanglewood Music Center presents a highlight of the 2003 Tanglewood season: the world premieres of two Boston Symphony Orchestra opera commissions from two of the TMC's brightest recent alumni, the Argentinian-born American composer Osvaldo Golijov (TMC '90) and Dutch composer Robert Zuidam (TMC '89). Scheduled for back-to-back performances as a double bill, both works are chamber operas of approximately 60 minutes in length, and will feature the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra and Vocal Fellows. Both operas were commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra specifically for the Tanglewood Music Center.
Two established artists will sing the lead roles - soprano Dawn Upshaw in the Golijov and soprano Lucy Shelton in the Zuidam - allowing the TMC players and singers to unique opportunity to work alongside professional counterparts who have established musical relationships with these composers. The Golijov work, Ainadamar, features a libretto by David Henry Hwang (who wrote the acclaimed Broadway play M. Butterfly) and chronicles the last days of Spanish poet and playwright Federico Garcia Before his murder during the Spanish Civil War, as recounted by the women in his life. It will be sung in Spanish and led by Robert Spano. This production is a joint commission of the BSO, Lincoln Center, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic.
Details on additional performances of this work will be announced at a later date. The Zuidam opera, Rage d'amours, deals with the story of Juana La Loca, the 16th century queen of Spain who upon the sudden death of her husband went insane and was committed for nearly the entirety of her reign. TMC Conduction Faculty member Stefan Asbury will lead these performances, which will be sung in Latin, old Spanish, and old French.
Mark Morris Collaboration
One of the dance world's most acclaimed and most musical choreographers, Mark Morris, joins forces with Tanglewood Music Center and cellist Yo-Yo Ma June 29 and 30 for a program of music and dance in Ozawa Hall. Tanglewood Music Center Vocal Fellows and the TMC Orchestra will accompany members of the Mark Morris Dance Group in two pieces - "Frisson," featuring Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind Instruments and "Jesu, meine Freude," set to Bach's Jesu, meine, Motet, BWV 227. Mr. Ma then revisits "Falling Down Stars," his own recent collaboration with Mr. Morris on Bach's Suite No. 3 in C for solo cello, BWV 1009. The work was created and filmed for a television special and home video several years ago at nearby Jacob's Pillow. Craig Smith conducts these special concerts. In addition to these concerts, Mr. Morris and members of his company will work with the TMC for about a week on the relationship between music and dance.
Sting Quartet Seminar
Each year the Tanglewood Music Center holds a 10-day workshop in quartet playing which explores this repertoire from Haydn through the 20th century. In 2003, the Quartet Seminar will open the TMC season, and will culminate in a series of marathon concerts on July 1 and 2. Participating Fellows will concentrate exclusively on the string quartet during this period. Distinguished guest artists participating in the 2003 TMC String Quartet Seminar, listed with their current or former ensemble affiliations, are BSO Principal Violist and founding member of the Muir String Quartet Steven Ansell, cellist Norman Fischer (Concord Sting Quartet), cellist Bonnie Hampton (Fransesco Trio), cellist Sadao Harado (Tokyo String Quartet), violinist Curtis Macomber (New World Sting Quartet), and violinist Mark Sokol (Concord String Quartet).
Festival of Contemporary Music and Composition Program
The 2003 Festival of Contemporary Music at Tanglewood will be held July 17-21, and will be directed in 2003 and 2004 by American conductor Robert Spano. Featured composers for this year's Festival will include young American Jennifer Higdon, Englishman George Benjamin, and Gyorgy Ligeti in his 80th birthday year.
The 2003 FCM open on Thursday, July 17, in Seiji Ozawa Hall with a performance of works by Higdon, Kurtag, and Crumb by soprano Dawn Upshaw, the New Fromm Players - a group of recent TMC alumni engaged by the Tanglewood Music Center to concentrate on and perform contemporary repertoire-and TMC Fellows. Mr. Benjamin's Ringed by the Flat Horizon will be performed by the Boston Symphony under Mr. Spano as part of the BSO's Shed concert on Friday, July 18.
The FCM's annual Fromm Concert at Tanglewood takes place this year on Sunday, July 20, with a trio of pianists exploring a theme running through the 2003 FCM, "The Sacred and the Profane." Pierre-Laurent Aimard open the concert with the American premiere of Shadowlines, a work written by him by George Benjamin and scheduled for its world premiers this winter, and continues with selections from Ligeti's seminal Piano Etudes. Robert Spano and pianist Ursula Oppens are also featured on this program, joining together for Messaiens's powerful Visions de l'Amen for two pianos.
To close the 2003 Festival of Contemporary Music on Monday, July 21, Robert Spano, George Benjamin, and TMC Conduction Program Coordinator Michael Morgan share the podium for the Margaret Lee Crofts Concert in Ozawa Hall, leading the TMCO in a program to include Mr. Benjamin's Paliimpsest 1 & 2, Oliver Knussen's Violin Concerto, Jacob Druckman's Summer Lightning, and Jennifer Higdon's Concerto for Orchestra. Additional FCM program details will be announced at a later date. The Festival of Contemporary Music is made possible by the generous support of Dr. Raymond and Hannah H. Schneider, with additional support through grants from The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, The Fromm Music Foundation, the Helen F. Whitaker Fund, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Composers scheduled to work with the Composition Fellows are TMC Faculty members Michael Gandolifi (Composition Program Coordinator), George Benjamin, Osvaldo Golijov, Augusta Read Thomas, and Robert Zuidam.
Orchestral and Conducting Program
This season, Oakland East Bay Symphony Music Director Michael Morgan will be in residence at Tanglewood for the entire summer as TMC Conduction Program Coordinator, with Robert Spano serving as Conduction Program Consultant. Guest conducting faculty members will include Kurt Masur, Hans Graf, Rafael Fruhbeck de Burgos, and Edo de Waart, with additional guests to be announced. Conduction Fellows will have opportunities to perform with the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra and conduct ensemble performances during the season. Members of the conduction class will work with a small ensemble, participate in solfege classes and attend Boston Symphony and Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra rehearsals.
This season, the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra will have the opportunity to work with some of the world's great conductors, performing music from throughout the repertoire. On Tuesday, July 8, Kurt Masur leads the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra in its first concert of the season, the Phyllis and Lee Coffey Memorial Fund Concert, in Seiji Ozawa Hall. Mr. Masur leads the orchestra in Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 for this concert, on a program with Beethoven's Symphony No. 2.
To close the 2003 Festival of Contemporary Music on Monday, July 21, Robert Spano, George Benjamin and Michael Morgan share the podium for the Margaret Lee Crofts Concert in Ozawa Hall, leading the TMCO in a program to include Mr. Benjamin's Palimpsest 1 & 2, Oliver Knussen's Violin Concerto, Jacob Druckman's Summer Lightning, and Jennifer Higdon's Concerto for Orchestra. On Tuesday, July 29, Rafael Fruhbeck de Burgos leads the TMC Orchestra in the Daniel and Shirlee Cohen Freed Concert in Ozawa Hall, with a program to include Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring.
The Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra makes its first of two scheduled appearances in the Koussevitzky Music Shed this season during Tanglewood on Parade on Tuesday, August 5. For the TMCO portion of this gala program, Edo de Waart will lead the orchestra in Britten's A Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra before TMCO members join Charles Dutoit and members of the Boston Symphony in the finale performance of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture.
Conductor James Conlon leads the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra in its final concert of the 2003 season - the annual Leonard Bernstein Memorial Concert - in the Koussevitzky Music Shed on Sunday, August 17. This program features the world premier of Mr. Conlon's own orchestral suite of music from Zemllinky's opera A Florentine Tragedy. The remainder of the program includes Brahms' Symphony No. 2 and Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto, the latter with Joshua Bell as soloist.
BSO Involvement
More than half of the members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra will participate in Tanglewood Music Center teaching, coaching, and curriculum preparation this season. Each section of the BSO (winds, brass, percussion, and strings) will be responsible for the educational experience of the young professionals who are their counterparts in the TMC, creating the balance and nature of activities for each section in the TMC orchestra.
BSO musicians will supervise, lead, or participate in sectional rehearsals, repertoire and master classes, orchestra and chamber music activities, and in regular exchanges between the two orchestra, BSO musicians are also deeply involved in the auditioning process; participating in this year's audition tour are trombonist Ronal Barron, trumpeter Peter Chapman, percussionist frank Epstein, percussionist Thomas Gauger, timpanist Timothy Genis, bassoonist Gregg Henegar, percussionist J.William Hodgins, hornist Daniel Katzen, violinist Ronan Lefkowitz, clarinetist Tom Martin, English hornist Robbert Sheena, flutist Fenwick Smith, harpist Ann Hobson pilot, bassist Todd Seeber, hornist James Sommerville, and bassist Larry Wolfe.
TMC Faculty
In addition to many members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Tanglewood Music Center faculty for the 2003 Tanglewood season is made up of some of the finest teachers and musicians in the world, including pianist Emanuel Ax, Claude Frank, and Ursula Oppens; singers Phyllis Curtin, William Sharp, Lucy Shelton, and Dawn Upshaw; Vocal Program Coordinator Kayo Iwama; vocal music coaches Kenneth Griffiths, Dennis Helmrich, Karl Paulnack, and Alan Smith; violinists Pamela Frank, Andrew Jennings, Curtis Macomber, Joseph Silverstein and Mark Sokol; cellists Norman Fischer (String Program coordinator), Bonnie Hampton, and Sadao Harada; violist Maria Lambros; horn Barry Truckwell; solfege instructor Roger Voisin; conductors Stefan Asbury (New Music Projects), Michael Morgan (Conducting Program coordinator), Craig Smith, and Robert Spano (Conducting Program consultant); reading ensemble pianist Vytas Baksys; and composers George Benjamin, Michael Gandolfi (composition Program coordinator), Osvaldo Golijov, Augusta Read Thomas, and Robert Zuidam.
Guest faculty giving masterclasses or lectures at the TMC this summer include conductors Rafael Fruhbeck de Burgos, Hans Graf, Kurt Masur, and Edo de Waart.
The Tanglewood Music Center Fellowship Program
The Tanglewood Music Center Fellowship program is for experienced musicians who have completed the majority of their formal training. The sole criterion for admission is musical excellence. The program is open to instrumentalists including pianists, singers and vocal pianists; composers, and conductors. Instrumental Fellows participate in a complex program involving work in orchestral music, chamber music, and contemporary music, as well as master classes held throughout the summer under the guidance of Boston Symphony Orchestra musicians and by other eminent artists. Singers and vocal pianists participate in coaching's and classes given by a distinguished voice faculty, leading to regularly scheduled performances.
The vocal program includes Phyllis Curtin's master classes, master classes given by visiting artists, classes in repertoire and language, and on intensive study of song, chamber music, contemporary music, and opera. The composition class includes up to eight composers, who wok with Tanglewood composers in residence and other visiting composers and have the opportunity to have their music performed at TMC concerts. The conducting class included up to two Fellows and up to six class members, in a program coordinated by Michael Morgan. Conducting Fellows have opportunities to perform with Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra and conduct ensemble performances during the season; the conducting class works with a small ensemble in the studio, participating in solfege classes and other activities. Both Fellows and class members work with distinguished guest artist's coaches, and attend Boston Symphony and Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra rehearsals.
History of The Tanglewood Music Center
Since its start as the Berkshire Music Center in 1940, the Tanglewood Music Center has been closely tied to the Boston Symphony Orchestra, its players, and its music directors. Serge Koussevitzky, who headed the BSO from 1924 to 1949, founded the school with the hope of creating a premier music academy where young instrumentalists, vocalists, conductors, and composers would sharpen their sills under the tutelage of the Boston Symphony Orchestra musicians and other world-class artists, with the resources of a great symphony at their disposal. To this end, he also enlisted some of the day's most important composer-teachers as faculty members, a tradition distinguished by the presence of such longtime TMC faculty as Aaron Copland and Paul Hindemith.
Koussevitzky helped develop that dream until 1950, a year after his retirement as BSO music director. Charles Munch, his successor in that position, took over the school's reins, returning to Koussevitzky's hands-on leadership approach while restoring a renewed emphasis on contemporary music. In 1970, three years before his appointment as BSO Music Director of the Tanglewood Music Center from 1985 to 1997. In November 1997, Ellen Highstein became Director of the Tanglewood Music Center, a position she holds today. According to recent estimates, 20 percent of the members of American symphony orchestras - and 30 percent of all first chair players - studied at Tanglewood Music Center.
In addition to Mr. Ozawa, prominent alumni of the Tanglewood Music Center include Claudio Abbado, Luciano Berio, the late Leonard Bernstein, David Del Tredici, Christoph von Dohnanyi, the late Jacob Druckman, Lukas Foss, John Harbison, Oliver Knussen, Lorin Maazel, Wynton Marsalis, Zubin Mehta, Sherrill Milnes, Leontne Price, Ned Rorem, Sanford Sylvan, Cheryl Studer, Michael Tilson Thomas, Dawn Upshaw, Shrley Verrett, and David Zinman.
Tanglewood History
Tanglewood, the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home located in the Berkshire hills of western Massachusetts, had its beginning in 1936 when the BSO gave its first outdoor concerts in the area, a three concert series held under a tent for a total crowd of 15,000. In 1937 the BSO returned to the Berkshires for an all-Beethoven program, again held under a tent but this time at Tanglewood, the 210-acre estate donated by the Tappan family, initiating a new era in the history of the American summer music festival. In 1938 the 5,100 seat Shed was inaugurated, giving the BSO a permanent open-air structure in which to perform at Tanglewood. The Boston Symphony Orchestra has performed in the Koussevitzky Music Shed every summer since, except for the war years 1942-45, and Tanglewood has become almost a place of pilgrimage to millions of concertgoers.
The 1986 acquisition of the Highwood estate next to Tanglewood increased the festival's public ground by 40 percent and allowed for the construction of Seiji Ozawa Hall, which opened in 1994 along with the Leonard Bernstein Campus, which became the center for most TMC activites. Seiji Ozawa hall serves not only as a performance home for the Tanglewood Music Center, but as a thoroughly modern venue for the BSO's varied recital and chamber music offerings. Today Tanglewood annually draws more than 350,000 visitors for orchestral and chamber music concerts, instrumental and vocal recitals, student performances, and the annual Festival of Contemporary Music, as well as performances by popular artists and the annual Labor Day weekend Jazz Festival. This season offers not only a vast quantity of music but also a vast range of musical forms and styles, all of it presented with a regard for artistic excellence that makes the festival unique.
All programs and artists are subject to change. For further information, call the Boston Symphony Orchestra at 617-266-1492. The Boston Symphony Orchestra is on the Internet at www.bso.org.
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Berkshire County Homes Celebrating Holiday Cheer
By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
There's holiday cheer throughout the Berkshires this winter.
Many homeowners are showing their holiday spirit by decorating their houses. We asked for submissions so those in the community can check out these fanciful lights and decor when they're out.
We asked the homeowners questions on their decorations and why they like to light up their houses.
In Great Barrington, Matt Pevzner has decorated his house with many lights and even has a Facebook page dedicated to making sure others can see the holiday joy.
Located at 93 Brush Hill Road, there's more than 61,000 lights strewn across the yard decorating trees and reindeer and even a polar bear.
The Pevzner family started decorating in September by testing their hundreds of boxes of lights. He builds all of his own decorations like the star 10-foot star that shines done from 80-feet up, 10 10-foot trees, nine 5-foot trees, and even the sleigh, and more that he also uses a lift to make sure are perfect each year.
"I always decorated but I went big during COVID. I felt that people needed something positive and to bring joy and happiness to everyone," he wrote. "I strive to bring as much joy and happiness as I can during the holidays. I love it when I get a message about how much people enjoy it. I've received cards thanking me how much they enjoyed it and made them smile. That means a lot."
Pevzner starts thinking about next year's display immediately after they take it down after New Year's. He gets his ideas by asking on his Facebook page for people's favorite decorations. The Pevzner family encourages you to take a drive and see their decorations, which are lighted every night from 5 to 10.
In North Adams, the Wilson family decorates their house with fun inflatables and even a big Santa waving to those who pass by.
The Wilsons start decorating before Thanksgiving and started decorating once their daughter was born and have grown their decorations each year as she has grown. They love to decorate as they used to drive around to look at decorations when they were younger and hope to spread the same joy.
"I have always loved driving around looking at Christmas lights and decorations. It's incredible what people can achieve these days with their displays," they wrote.
The Wilsons' invite you to come and look at their display at 432 Church St. that's lit from 4:30 to 10:30 every night, though if it's really windy, the inflatables might not be up as the weather will be too harsh.
In Pittsfield, Travis and Shannon Dozier decorated their house for the first time this Christmas as they recently purchased their home on Faucett Lane. The two started decorating in November, and hope to bring joy to the community.
"If we put a smile on one child's face driving by, then our mission was accomplished," they said.
Many homeowners are showing their holiday spirit by decorating their houses. We asked for submissions so those in the community can check out these fanciful lights and decor when they're out.
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