The Arts

Yellow Barn Festival Begins July 10

Chamber Music Series Continues Through August 8

PUTNEY—The Yellow Barn Music Festival will begin its season Friday, July 10, with an 8 p.m. concert starting with the late Mauricio Kagel’s “For us: Happy birthday to you!” for four cellos, as a salute to the festival’s fortieth year. Also on the program will be sonatas by Zelenka and Ives, the latter performed by former Cleveland Quartet first violinist Donald Weilerstein, and pianist Vivian Hornik Weilerstein, and Dvorak’s dramatic, complex and energetic Piano Trio in F minor, Op. 65, performed by the Naumburg Award-winning Peabody Trio. The concert is sponsored by Chittenden Bank. Prior to the concert, at 6 p.m., an informal potluck supper will welcome visitors to the Yellow Barn campus at the Greenwood School in Putney at 6 p.m., and a reception will follow the performance.

On Saturday, July 11, the Festival will host a 10:30 a.m. public master class with renowned pianist Gilbert Kalish, longtime faculty chair at Tanglewood and current head of performance activities at Stony Brook University. This class will be one of a series offered during the summer with world-class musician/educators, and will be an excellent opportunity to get an inside look at the preparation of chamber music for public performance.

Saturday night at 7 p.m. there will be a free pre-concert discussion at the Putney Public Library, featuring composer Alex Mincek, cellist Michael Kannen, who chairs the chamber music department at the Peabody Conservatory, and the Ariel Quartet. The 8 p.m. concert which follows at the Yellow Barn will include a work by Mincek and will conclude with the Ariels performing Beethoven’s String Quartet in A minor, Op. 132.

The season will continue with up to five chamber music events each week through August 8, including concerts, classes, discussions, suppers and community outreach concerts for children, seniors and others. Among the performers will be longtime Cleveland Quartet members Paul Katz, cello, and Weilerstein, violin; Grammy Award-winning violist Roger Tapping, formerly of the Takács Quartet; Irish Chamber Orchestra director and violinist Anthony Marwood; Cannes and Grammy-Award-winning soprano Susan Narucki; baritone William Sharp; internationally revered composer Leon Kirchner; pianist Peter Frankl, and many others. Thirty-six young professional musicians participate in the program, in a supportive, yet extremely challenging 5-week session.

Season highlights will include a mid-season 40th anniversary gala on July 18, featuring intimate dinners, an elegant reception and a performance by pianist Peter Frankl; an open house at the Greenwood campus on July 25; a founders’ concert honoring Yellow Barn founders David and Janet Wells of Putney on July 31; a scholarship benefit concert in honor of local patron of the arts John Burt of Putney on August 7; and the season finale on August 8. There will also be two concerts at Smith College in Northampton, Mass., on July 29 and August 5.

The Yellow Barn began in 1969 as a small summer workshop founded by the Wellses, and has since evolved into an internationally respected professional training institute. Participants are selected by audition from among hundreds of applicants from around the world, and are students or recent graduates of many of the world’s finest music schools and conservatories. The current artistic director is Peabody Trio founding pianist, Seth Knopp, who succeeded David and Janet Wells upon their retirement in 2002. Concerts are at the “Big Barn” in Putney, which is air-conditioned and handicapped-accessible, and was especially constructed for chamber music presentations.

2009 festival programming is supported in part by the Vermont Arts Council, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Vermont Humanities Council, Vermont Public Radio, WFCR Radio for Western New England, Chittenden Bank, SoVerNet and Douglas Cox Violins.

For information, directions and reservations, call 802-387-6637 or visit www.yellowbarn.org.

www.yellowbarn.org