Mostly Mozart Festival

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The Mostly Mozart Festival is a summer series of concerts held at Lincoln Center in New York City and in other city venues. Currently, the artistic director is Jane Moss while the music director is Louis Langrée. The annual summer festival features performances by the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, as well as opera, dance, chamber music and contemporary performances. In recent years, the Festival initiated a popular series of late-night performances in the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse, called "A Little Night Music." [1] In 2006, it celebrated its 40th anniversary and the 250th anniversary of its namesake Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's birth. As it has done for many years, it is performing many of "Mozart's works and also a variety of musical works created after his death that were inspired and influenced by his genius".[2]

The Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra is the resident orchestra of the Mostly Mozart Festival and is the only orchestra in the U.S. dedicated to the music of the Classical period. Members of the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra come from all over the world, performing in such premier orchestras and ensembles as the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, MET Orchestra, New York City Ballet Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony, and St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, among others.

Internationally celebrated conductor Louis Langrée has been music director of the Mostly Mozart Festival since December 2002, and was named Renée and Robert Belfer Music Director in August 2006. His contract at Mostly Mozart Festival runs through 2017.[3] Each summer since 2005, the Festival Orchestra’s Avery Fisher Hall home at Lincoln Center is transformed into an appropriately intimate venue for its performances. Over the years, the Festival Orchestra has toured to such notable festivals and venues as Ravinia, Great Woods, Tanglewood, Bunkamura in Tokyo, and the Kennedy Center.

Conductors who made their New York debuts leading the Festival Orchestra include Jérémie Rhorer, Edward Gardner, Lionel Bringuier, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Charles Dutoit, Leonard Slatkin, David Zinman, and Edo de Waart. Mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli, flutist James Galway, soprano Elly Ameling, and pianist Mitsuko Uchida all made their U.S. debuts with the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra.[4]

History

Co-founded by impresario Jay K. Hoffman and William Lockwood, Midsummer Serenades – A Mozart Festival began on August 1, 1966.[5] This program, made possible by Lincoln Center's new, air-conditioned halls, would eventually turn into what is today the Mostly Mozart Festival. On January 27, 1991, The Mozart Bicentennial at Lincoln Center opened with concerts held at Avery Fisher Hall and the Metropolitan Opera House. It was the world's largest and most comprehensive tribute to the life and works of Mozart.[6] The 2014 festival took place from July 25 to August 23 at various venues around Lincoln Center, as well as the Park Avenue Armory.

Partial List of Past Featured Artists

Current Festival Orchestra Members

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  • Martin Agee
  • Ruggero Allifranchini, concertmaster
  • Eva Burmeister
  • Robert Chausow
  • Katsuko Esaki
  • Laura Frautschi, principal second
  • Lilit Gampel
  • Michael Gillette
  • Suzanne Gilman
  • Amy Kauffman
  • Sophia Kessinger
  • Katherine Livolsi-Landau
  • Ronald Oakland
  • Michael Roth
  • Dorothy Strahl
  • Deborah Wong
  • Mineko Yajima

Viola

  • Meena Bhasin
  • Danielle Farina
  • Chihiro Fukuda
  • Shmuel Katz, principal
  • Jack Rosenberg

Cello

  • Ted Ackerman
  • Ilya Finkelshteyn, principal
  • Ann Kim
  • Alvin McCall

Double Bass

Flute

  • Tanya Witek
  • Yoobin Son, principal

Oboe

  • Randall Ellis, principal
  • Nick Masterson

Clarinet

Bassoon

  • Marc Goldberg, principal
  • Tom Sefcovic

Horn

  • Lawrence DiBello, principal
  • Richard Hagen

Trumpet

  • Neil Balm, principal
  • Lee Soper

Timpani

  • David Punto, principal

References

  1. ↑ "New York Times | Mostly Mozart, Mostly Improved". Retrieved May 23, 2014.
  2. ↑ Moss, Jane; Langrée, Louis. On Anniversaries. Mostly Mozart Festival July 28 – August 26, 2006 PLAYBILL.
  3. ↑ "New York Times | Langrée Signs On for More Mostly Mozart"
  4. ↑ "Lincoln Center | About the Festival Orchestra". Retrieved May 23, 2014.
  5. ↑ http://www.jaykhoffman.com/aboutus/who_we_are.htm
  6. ↑ http://www.lincolncenter.org/aboutLC/archive_history70s.asp?session=ECD1&version=&ws=&bc=99
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