Mostly Mozart Festival

Mostly Mozart Festival
Status Active
Genre Music festival
Frequency Annually
Venue Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts and others
Location(s) New York City
Country United States
Years active 50
Founders Jay K. Hoffman and William Lockwood
Organised by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Website
mostlymozart.org

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 David Geffen 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. The 50th anniversary season, in 2016, will feature opera, dance, a world premiere by David Lang for a chorus of 1,000 singers, and 50 new works performed by the International Contemporary Ensemble, as well as an exhibition at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts showcasing the history of the Festival.[6]

Current Festival Orchestra Members

Violin

Viola

Cello

Double Bass

Flute

Oboe

Clarinet

Bassoon

Horn

Trumpet

Timpani

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. 1 2 http://www.lincolncenter.org/aboutLC/archive_history70s.asp?session=ECD1&version=&ws=&bc=99
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