The 36th Annual Rockport Chamber Music Festival opens in a Gala concert with the world-renowned violinist Joshua Bell on Friday, June 2 at 6 p.m. One of the most celebrated violinists of our time, Joshua Bell has won numerous awards, and been honored as Musical America’s Instrumentalist of the Year. Music Director of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, Bell is also well-known for his acclaimed recordings of works by Bernstein and Gershwin and thrilling crossover albums with Edgar Meyer, Béla Fleck and Sam Bush.
This year’s festival is particularly momentous because Artistic Director David Deveau, who has led the organization for the last 22 years, is presenting his final Festival at Rockport Music. He announced in Fall 2015 that Festival 2017 would be his final one so that he can spend more time focusing on his performing, recording, and teaching career. He has overseen the growth of a small, regional chamber music festival to one of the premiere presenting organizations in the nation, with the Shalin Liu Performance Center as a lasting legacy and home for great music for generations to come.
On Saturday, June 3 at 8 p.m., David Deveau joins with violinist Bayla Keyes, violist Steven Ansell, and Michael Reynolds for a program of Beethoven, Fauré, and the world premiere of Charles Shadle’s Dogtown Common. Shadle describes his inspiration for Dogtown Common as “the long-abandoned community bordering the old inland road from Rockport to Gloucester. The landscape is rugged…often in a tangle of vegetation. Today it is conservation land, valued for its beauty, as a place to walk and to breathe the air that pushes in from the sea.”
Opening weekend continues Sunday, June 4 at 5 p.m., with the world-renowned Canadian Brass in a varied program of brass quintet arrangements of works by J.S. Bach, Monteverdi, Mozart, and Schumann, as well as a tribute to Leonard Bernstein. The program closes Kompanek’s Tribute to the Ballet.
The festival continues on Thursday, June 8 at 8 p.m. with cellist Jonah Ellsworth and pianist Heng-Jin Park, two of the three members of the Boston Trio. The program features works by Janá?ek, Mendelssohn, George Crumb and Brahms.
On Friday, June 9 at 8 p.m., the Jupiter Quartet and Jasper Quartet join forces for a program of Haydn’s Quartet in F major, Op. 77, No. 2 (Jasper), Ligeti’s Quartet No. 1 (Jupiter), and Mendelssoh’s Octet in E-flat major, Op. 20.
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Jupiter Quartet
On Saturday, June 10, at 8 p.m., legendary pianist Russell Sherman performs an all-Beethoven program, including Sonata N9. 27 in E minor, Op. 90, Sonata No. 28 in A major, Op. 101, Rondo in G major, Op. 51, No. 2 and the Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111.
On Sunday, June 11 at 5 p.m., the Jupiter Quartet returns for a concert with two-time Grammy Award-winning clarinetist Richard Stoltzman. The Jupiter performs Beethoven’s String Quartet in E-flat major, Op. 74 “Harp” and Golijov’s Yiddishbbuk. The Quartet joins with Stoltzman for Mozart’s Quintet for clarinet and strings in A major, K. 581.
The festival continues through July 9 with over 20 concerts and education activities, and includes performances by pianists Garrick Ohlsson, Joyce Yang, and Charlie Albright, the Brentano and Escher quartets, as well as the Lorelei Ensemble, Boston Camerata, New York Woodwind Quintet, and the Handel and Haydn Society. The Festival features a second world premiere by David Alpher, co-founder of the Rockport Chamber Music Festival (June 24), entitled Between Twilights: Seven Songs on Poems of Marsden Hartley. This work also has influences and connections to Cape Ann and New England.
A full listing of the Rockport Chamber Music Festival with program details can be found here.