By Eileen Wingard
LA JOLLA, California — The La Jolla Music Festival’s Summerfest will present a wealth of musical offerings on the theme, “Inside Stories,” during its four weeks of concerts at the Conrad, from July 26-August 24.
Summerfest’s Music Director, Israeli native, Inon Barnatan, continues to bring innovative ideas and attract some of the world’s most outstanding artists to the festival.The opening multi-media concert on July 26, “A Deal with the Devil,” features Stravinsky’s “A Soldier’s Tale.” The August 16 concert will feature pianist Conrad Tao and tap dancer, Caleb Teicher. Two unusual jazz programs at the JAI, Brandee Younger’s harp trio and Dan Tepfer’s piano improvisations with electronic machines, will be offered August 8 and 9
Some of the returning artists include violinists James Ehnes, Augustin Hadlich and Stefan Jackiw; violinist/violist Yura Lee; cellist Alisa Weilerstein; clarinetist Anthony McGill and, of course, pianist Inon Barnatan who will participate in six of the 19 programs. A number of San Diego Symphony members will also be participating: principal bass, Jeremy Kurtz-Harris, principal flute, Rose Lombardo, bassoon, Leyla Zamora, horn, Tricia Skye, and harp, Julie Smith Phillips.
As in past seasons, there is an abundance of free offerings at Summerfest, including two coaching sessions with the fellowship ensembles the Abeo Quartet and the Fellowship Artist Trio/Quartet at 10 a.m. and 11 a.m. each Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of every festival week.
In addition, there will be three open rehearsals and interviews hosted by Leah Rosenthal, the La Jolla Music Society’s Artistic Director. There will also be a free screening of the movie, The Last Repair Shop, and a lecture, “The Art of Listening,” by Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim, former New York Times music critic. A Prelude will precede each programmed concert an hour before, consisting of music or a speaker, free to all ticket holders.
The July 26 opening concert, “A Deal with the Devil,” will include puppets and projections by The Paper Cinema in a performance of Stravinsky’s “A Soldier’s Tale,” with live narration by actor Danny Burstein. The next evening, the concert entitled, “Danse Macabre,” will include that work by Camille Saint-Saens as well as works by Eugene Ysaye, Maurice Ravel, Franz Schubert and contemporary composers Martin Butler and Thomas Ades, who is returning to the festival for the second time as the composer-in-residence.
Concerts which may be of special interest to San Diego Jewish World readers because they feature works by Jewish composers or Jewish-inspired music include the Saturday, August 3, 7:30 p.m. program
entitled, “Resilience,” with music by both Felix and his sister, Fanny Mendelssohn; the Italian-Jewish composer, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco; and the German-Jewish composer, Erwin Schulhoff, who died in 1942 in a Nazi concentration camp.
Saturday, August 17, 7:30 p.m., “California Dreaming,” will have works by Hungarian-Jewish film composer, Miklos Rozsa, and the “Theme from Schindler’s List,” by John Williams. Other compositions on that program will be by Sergei Rachmaninoff, Reena Esmail, Terry Riley and John Adams.
The “Summerfest Finale” on Saturday, August 24, 7:30 p.m. will
feature works by American-Jewish composers Paul Schoenfield and Leonard Bernstein. Other compositions will be by Ralph Vaughan Williams and Antonin Dvorak.
For complete listings of Summerfest offerings, you can obtain a brochure from the Conrad box office, visit their website: TheConrad.org or phone: 858-459-3728.
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Eileen Wingard is a freelance writer specializing in coverage of the arts.