CONDUCTORS INSTITUTE AT BARD COLLEGE ANNOUNCES ITS SUMMER 2007 PROGRAM

“No serious conductor should miss the opportunity to study at the Institute.” —Marin Alsop, Principal Conductor of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and Music Director Designate of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y.—The Bard College Conservatory of Music presents the 2007 summer program of The Conductors Institute (CI) at Bard from June 25 to August 3. The Institute, founded and directed by conductor and composer Harold Farberman, offers programs for professional and student conductors and composers. Participants in the six-week summer program work directly with Maestro Farberman, who anchors the faculty of guest conductors and composers in residence. New visiting faculty and repertoire each week assure all Institute participants of exposure to a variety of expert opinions. In addition, there are evening lectures with internationally known scholars, composers, and conductors. The 2007 Institute’s faculty includes special guest maestro Leon Botstein; visiting maestri Lawrence Golan, Raymond Harvey, Apo Hsu, and Sidney Rothstein; and composer in residence Tobias Picker. The permanent faculty includes Maestri Farberman and Eduardo Navega, director of the Discovery Program. The Institute offers study combinations that enable students to tailor their own programs. Students may enroll in the entire four-week program or one two-week segment of the Conducting Program for Fellows and Colleagues; in two-week programs, including the Discovery Program and the Composer-Conductor Program; or in the one-week program in Visual Score Study/Baton Placement and Body Movement Technique. Visual Score Study/Baton Placement and Body Movement Technique is offered from June 25 to June 29. This program unites the study of Institute repertoire, using visual score study/baton placement techniques, with instruction in the Alexander Technique as it relates directly to the enhancement of performance skills and expression. Maestro Farberman teaches visual score study and baton placement; Alexander Farkas teaches the Alexander Technique. The Conducting Program for Fellows and Colleagues will be offered from July 2 to July 27. Fellows work with the Institute Orchestra during morning sessions, while Colleagues work with the Institute String Quintet during afternoon sessions and with the Institute Orchestra on Fridays. -continued- Repertoire includes Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, Op. 125, “Choral”; Bernstein’s symphonic dances from West Side Story; Brahms’s Symphony No. 1 in C Minor, Op. 68; Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 in G Major; Mozart’s Symphony No. 40 in G Minor, K. 550; Ravel’s Rapsodie espagnole; Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Overture; Verdi’s Requiem; and Tobias Picker’s And Suddenly It’s Evening. The Discovery Program, offered from July 9 to July 20, is directed by Eduardo Navega and is designed for conductors with limited experience who wish to improve their basic skills. Participants work with a string quartet in afternoon sessions for two weeks and attend all morning and evening sessions of the Conducting Program. Repertoire includes Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusik, Grieg’s Holberg Suite, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1. As a postlude to the Conducting Program, the Composer-Conductor Program is offered from July 23 to August 3. Composers who want to learn the fundamentals of conducting technique are encouraged to apply. During the first week, composers attend all morning and evening sessions of the Institute and work in the afternoon on basic technique, conducting a string quartet (repertoire includes Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusik, Grieg’s Holberg Suite, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1). In week two, each composer is paired with a conductor in the graduate program who prepares the composer’s work for performance by the Composers’ Chamber Ensemble. Founded by Farberman in 1979, The Conductors Institute filled a void in the United States for a training program for conductors. “I hit on a formula that remains the same to this day—vigorous technical training and promotion of American music in a cooperative atmosphere,” says Farberman. The Conductors Institute, in its third decade and its ninth year at Bard College, also offers a 15-month program leading to a master of fine arts degree in conducting. For two consecutive summers, master’s degree candidates participate in the Institute’s six-week program. During the intervening academic year, candidates complete required course work at Bard, including classes in composition, basic orchestral repertoire, languages, a second instrument (string or piano), and solfège, in addition to master classes in technical score study and analysis with Maestro Farberman. The program also offers podium time, including class sessions with the Institute String Quintet and conducting opportunities with orchestra and chorus, during the academic year. The culmination of the program, during the second summer, is a completion concert with the Institute Orchestra. Scholarship assistance is available for a limited number of qualified applicants. The deadline for application to both the six-week Conductors Institute and the master of fine arts degree in conducting is April 1, 2007. Bard College is located in New York’s Hudson River Valley, 90 miles north of New York City and one hour from Tanglewood. For further information and an application, call the Conductors Institute at 845-758-7425, e-mail [email protected], or visit the website, www.bard.edu/ci. # The Faculty Conductor and composer Harold Farberman has written diverse works for orchestra, three operas, numerous chamber works, a score for an Academy Award–winning documentary film, and music for dance companies. Many of his works, which have been performed all over the world, are represented on three Albany Records CDs devoted to his music. As a conductor and an advocate of modern music, Maestro Farberman received the Ives Award for his definitive interpretations of the work of Charles Ives. His recordings of Mahler, Michael Haydn, and Irwin Bazelon, as well as of Ives and his own music, have earned worldwide recognition for excellence. Farberman founded the Conductors Guild and is the author of a pioneering work, The Art of Conducting Technique: A New Perspective, an innovative approach to the physical placement and movement of the baton. He is also the founder and artistic director of the Conductors Institute and director of Bard’s Master of Fine Arts Degree Program in Conducting. A member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s percussion section from 1951 to 1963, Farberman was its youngest performer when he joined the orchestra immediately after graduating from The Juilliard School of Music. Eduardo Navega, director of the Discovery Program, is a native of Brazil. He began his music studies at an early age in São Paulo. He received his bachelor’s degree in composition and conducting from the University of Campinas and his master’s degree in music from the University of Sheffield. He is currently completing his doctor of musical arts degree in conducting at the Hartt School of Music. He has studied with Benito Juarez, Henrique Gregori, and Harold Farberman. From 1978 to 1989, he was conductor of the University of São Paulo choir. During this time he wrote a number of arrangements of Brazilian popular songs, most of which are still in the repertoire of choirs throughout Brazil. Navega was assistant conductor of the Campinas Symphony Orchestra and an assistant professor of choral and orchestral conducting at the University of Campinas. From 1992 to 1993, he was the conductor of the University of Sheffield Chamber Orchestra and received public and critical acclaim for his performances. Navega was named Up-and-Coming Conductor of the Year in 1995 by the APCA, a prestigious critics association in the state of São Paulo. He is a visiting assistant professor and director of orchestral activities at Vassar College. Special Guest Maestro Leon Botstein is music director and principal conductor of the American Symphony Orchestra and the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the radio orchestra of Israel. Radio broadcasts of some of Botstein’s concerts with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra may be heard in syndication throughout the United States. He is also the founder and coartistic director of the Bard Music Festival. Highlights for the upcoming season include guest engagements with NDR-Hamburg, the Capetown Philharmonic, and a gala event with the BBC Symphony at the Royal Albert Hall with a live telecast and recording. In addition, this season Botstein will record Bruno Walter’s Symphony No. 1 and Paul Dukas’s opera Ariane et Barbe-bleue, which he conducted last season at New York City Opera. Last season Botstein conducted Die ägyptische Helena with Deborah Voigt in Madrid and made appearances with the Düsseldorf Symphony. He also led a triumphant monthlong North American tour with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra. His recording with the London Symphony Orchestra of Gavriil Popov’s epic Symphony No. 1 and Shostakovich’s Theme and Variations, Op. 3, received a Grammy nomination in the category of Best Orchestral Performance. Another recording, Chausson’s opera Le roi Arthus with the BBC Symphony for Telarc, has been released to rave reviews. Other acclaimed recordings include two discs with the American Symphony Orchestra: music by Copland, Sessions, Perle, and Rands for New World Records, and music by Ernst von Dohnányi for Bridge Records. Botstein has also conducted on a prestigious series of recordings for Telarc, which includes Liszt’s Dante Symphony and Tasso; Glière’s Symphony No. 3, “Ilya Murometz” (all with the London Symphony); Max Reger’s Böcklin Tone Poems and Romantic Suite; Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra; music of Karol Szymanowski; symphonies of Karl Amadeus Hartmann; Dohnányi’s D-minor Symphony; and Bruckner’s Fifth Symphony in the Schalk edition (all with the London Philharmonic). With the American Symphony Orchestra and also for Telarc, he has recorded live performances of two operas by Richard Strauss: Die ägyptische Helena with Deborah Voigt and Die Liebe der Danae with Lauren Flanigan. Botstein’s extensive discography also includes works by Brahms, Schubert, Bruch, and Mendelssohn. He is the editor of The Musical Quarterly and the author of numerous articles and books. In 2004 he addressed the United Nations on “Why Music Matters” as part of Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s lecture series. For his contributions to music he has received the award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and Harvard University’s prestigious Centennial Award, as well as the Cross of Honor, First Class from the government of Austria. Since 1975 he has been president of Bard College, where he is also Leon Levy Professor in the Arts and Humanities. Visiting Maestri In September 2006, Lawrence Golan began his tenure as resident conductor of the Phoenix Symphony. He also continues as a guest conductor with professional orchestras, opera, and ballet companies in the United States and around the world. He has conducted in more than 20 U.S. states and 10 countries, including concerts with the Russian State Symphony Orchestra in Moscow and the Harrogate Symphony Orchestra in England, and a tour of Italy with the Orchestra Citta’ di Grosseto. Known for his inspired performances, imaginative programming, passion for developing new audiences, and engaging off-podium interactions, Golan is also recognized for his expertise in the complete spectrum of musical styles and periods. He is music director/conductor of the Boulder Bach Festival, and has won the ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming of Contemporary Music every year since 2003. A staunch supporter of music education, he also conducts the Phoenix Symphony Guild Youth Orchestra while continuing his work as director of orchestral studies at the University of Denver’s Lamont School of Music, where he teaches graduate conducting majors and conducts the Lamont Symphony Orchestra and Opera Theatre. A native of Chicago, Golan holds degrees from the Indiana University School of Music (B.M. and M.M.) and the New England Conservatory of Music (D.M.A.). He also has studied at all of the major conducting festivals, including Aspen and Tanglewood, where in 1999 he was awarded the Leonard Bernstein Conducting Fellowship. The long list of distinguished conductors with whom he has studied includes Robert Spano, Jorma Panula, David Zinman, Seiji Ozawa, Gustav Meier, Leonard Slatkin, Marin Alsop, Murry Sidlin, and Harold Farberman. Golan’s most recent recordings, with the Czech Republic’s Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra, have been released on the Albany Records label. Funky Little Crustaceans features orchestral music by Colorado composer William Hill, and Dreams of the Child of Light is a collection of works for Native American flute and orchestra with James Pellerite, former principal flutist of the Philadelphia Orchestra and now one of the world’s premiere Native American flutists. His edition and reduced orchestration of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker is published by Spurwink River Publishing and is used by orchestras and ballet companies across North America, including the Portland Ballet Company, of which Golan is music director. His most recent publication is a scholarly-performing edition of the solo violin works of J. S. Bach that includes a handbook on Baroque performance practice. With an immediately noticeable style that has been described as “elegant, but suffused with energy,” Raymond Harvey has garnered critical acclaim on symphonic podiums throughout the United States. Currently in his seventh season as music director of the Kalamazoo Symphony, he has also been music director of the Fresno Philharmonic and the Springfield Symphony. He has appeared as guest conductor with many of the country’s leading orchestras, including Philadelphia, Atlanta, St. Louis, Utah, Indianapolis, Rochester, Buffalo, Detroit, Louisville, New Orleans, and San Antonio, as well as the New York Philharmonic’s Young People’s Concerts and the Boston Pops. Equally at home in the world of opera, Harvey serves as music director of the El Paso Opera and has conducted the company’s productions of Tosca, Carmen, Madama Butterfly, Don Giovanni, La Bohème, and Aida, among others. An excellent pianist and accomplished choral conductor, Harvey holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and a doctor of musical arts degree from the Yale School of Music. He has been featured in Ebony and Symphony magazines, and is profiled in Antoinette Handy’s book Black Conductors. Apo Hsu “generates electricity from the podium in two directions: into the orchestra and into the audience,” according to the Oregonian. This year marks her third season as orchestra director at the National Taiwan Normal University. She also made homecoming guest appearances with the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra at its 58th anniversary celebration concert and spring concert, the Taipei Symphony Orchestra, and Taipei’s Festival Orchestra. Last season marked her debut with the Kaohsiung City Symphony Orchestra in Taiwan as well as the Sung Nam and Prime Philharmonic Orchestras in Seoul, Korea. For eight years, Hsu was the music director and conductor of the Springfield Symphony in Missouri. Previously, she served as artistic director of the Women’s Philharmonic in San Francisco and as music director and conductor of the Oregon Mozart Players in Eugene, after completing a three-year tenure as affiliate artist/NEA assistant conductor of the Oregon Symphony. In September 2001 Avon Women in Concert presented Hsu on tour in Brazil with the Women’s Philharmonic; in the spring of 2000 producer Debbie Allen included Hsu with the Women’s Philharmonic in a series entitled “Cool Women,” which was broadcast on cable television. Hsu and the Women’s Philharmonic made their first recording together on a Koch International Classics CD featuring the symphonic music of African American composer Florence Price. Hsu and the Women’s Philharmonic received four consecutive Awards for Adventurous Programming from ASCAP and the American Symphony Orchestra League. Guest appearances take Hsu all over the United States as well as Russia and the Far East. She has served on the faculty of both the American Symphony Orchestra League Conducting Workshops and National Youth Orchestra Festival 2000. Sidney Rothstein, who is known for his expertise in audience development and programming for orchestras, was the music director of the Reading Symphony Orchestra (Pennsylvania) for 30 years and for 10 years was music director of the Ridgefield Symphony Orchestra (Connecticut). A native of Pennsylvania, he began his career as music director of the Orchestra Society of Philadelphia, conducting Mahler’s Eighth Symphony, broadcast on National Public Radio, during Philadelphia’s bicentennial celebration. Rothstein has also served as music director of the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra and the Florida Symphony Orchestra, and as associate conductor of the Honolulu Symphony. He taught conducting at the New School of Music in Philadelphia, then under the direction of Max Aronoff. Composer in Residence Tobias Picker has been described by BBC Music Magazine as “displaying a distinctively soulful style that is one of the glories of the current musical scene.” His catalogue includes works in all genres: three symphonies; four operas; three piano concertos; concerti for violin, viola, cello, and oboe; songs; and chamber music. Picker’s The Encantadas, composed in 1983, has been performed internationally in seven languages, with Sir John Gielgud recording it for Virgin Classics in 1989. The Santa Fe Opera gave the world premiere of his first opera, Emmeline, in 1996. It was nationally telecast on PBS’s Great Performances and its premiere at New York City Opera was hailed by the New York Times as one of the 10 most significant musical events of 1998. Since that time Picker has become recognized as one of America’s foremost composers of opera. His fourth opera, An American Tragedy, based on the novel of the same name by Theodore Dreiser, was commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera and premiered in the fall of 2005. The chamber version of his opera Thérèse Raquin had its world premiere in March 2006 in London, at the Linbury Studio of the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden; it is scheduled for a New York premiere by the Dicapo Opera Theatre in February 2007. Picker’s music is widely recorded. Most recently, Chandos Records released a disc including his Cello Concerto, Keys to the City, and And Suddenly It’s Evening, as well as the premiere recording of his third opera, Thérèse Raquin. His music has also been recorded by Sony Classical, Virgin Classics, Nonesuch, Ondine, and First Edition, among other labels. Picker studied at the Manhattan School of Music, The Juilliard School, and Princeton University and is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the Bearns Prize (Columbia University), a Charles Ives Scholarship, and a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship. In 1992, he received the prestigious Award in Music from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has served as composer in residence of the Houston Symphony as well as for major international festivals, including the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival and the Pacific Music Festival. He has received commissions and performances from the Munich, Helsinki, New York, and Strasbourg philharmonics; the BBC Symphony, Baltimore, Chicago, Cleveland, Houston, Jerusalem, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh Symphony, Saint Paul Chamber, and San Francisco orchestras; as well as the BBC Proms, Zurich Tonhalle, Pacific Music Festival, Kuhmo International Music Festival, Peter Serkin, Emmanuel Ax, Ursula Oppens, Paul Watkins, Young Uck Kim, Barbara Hendricks. # # # (12/08/06)

This event was last updated on 01-25-2007

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