Sunday, February 4 2024 John Williams guides a journey through cinematic history and the soundtracks that scored Hollywood’s greatest moments
Since talkies first showed music’s power to transform moving images, composers have heightened on-screen action and illuminated unspoken drama with soundtracks as inventive and wide-ranging as the films they scored. Few have a greater appreciation for the history of film music—or a larger impact on its story—than John Williams and the maestro of the movies curates this exploration of cinematic composition featuring landmark Hollywood scores performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic and conducted by David Newman.
OFWC Walt Disney Hall Trip includes:
Bus Transportation
Tiered tickets to the Concert featuring works by John Williams
$300 – Terrace
$350 – Orchestra West
$425 – Front Orchestra
Dinner at Marcello’s in Thousand Oaks
Snacks on the returned bus ride
Contribution to the OFWC
Final instructions will be sent by January 20, 2024. If you have any questions, please contact Barbara Hirsch at 805-570-0160.
November 11, 7:30pm performance Greenberg Center, Ojai Valley School lower campus
The Ojai Music Festival presents a special concert celebrating the unique musical creativity of a new generation of California composers, produced as part of the statewide California Festival: A Celebration of New Music. Our program brings together a new work for solo piano by Samuel Carl Adams for the brilliant pianist Conor Hanick (fondly remembered for his performances as part of AMOC at the 2022 Ojai Festival) and a kinetic trio for violin, clarinet, and vibes by Dylan Mattingly (whose work featured prominently at the 2021 Ojai Festival). M.A. Tiesenga’s Ganymedes brings together the otherworldly sound of an electronic hurdy-gurdy playing with amplified string quartet. And Reena Esmail’s Ragamala adds the mesmerizing sound of Hindustani vocals to a string quartet, evoking the tradition of sounding the raga as a starting point for elaboration and reflection.
This is an all-ages event. Join us for a drink and mingling with the composers at 6:30pm. Concert begins at 7:30pm.
I. Fantasie – Bihag Overlay II. Scherzo – Malkauns III. Recitativo – Basant IV. Rondo – Jog
Saili Oak vocals | Zelter Quartet
Samuel Carl ADAMS Études
I. Clear, resonant II. Rippling III. Steady, quiet IV. Rippling V. Steady, with a full sound VI. Clear, resonant
Conor Hanick piano
Études (vol. 1) was commissioned by Music Academy of the West. The first performance was given by the Piano Fellows of the Music Academy on July 17, 2023 at Hahn Hall, Santa Barbara, CA.
Samuel Adams (b. 1985) is an American composer whose music weaves acoustic and digital sound into “mesmerizing” (New York Times) orchestrations. Sought after by orchestras and contemporary ensembles alike, he has received commissions from a broad range of organizations including San Francisco Symphony, Carnegie Hall, New World Symphony, The Australian Chamber Orchestra, and Spektral Quartet, and has collaborated with performers and conductors such as Esa-Pekka Salonen, David Robertson, MTT, violinists Anthony Marwood, Jennifer Koh, Karen Gomyo, and pianists Emanuel Ax, Sarah Cahill, David Fung, and Joyce Yang.
The 2022-23 season highlights several world premieres including Echo Transcriptions, a new work for electric violin and orchestra commissioned by the Australian Chamber Orchestra for Richard Tognetti. The work will be taken on a national tour of Australia in late 2022 and will receive North American performances in California and Toronto the following Spring. In February, pianist Conor Hanick and the San Francisco Symphony premiere a new work under the baton of Esa-Pekka Salonen, and the following week, the Cincinnati Symphony premieres Adams’s Variations, a 2020 orchestral work co-commissioned by the CSO and the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic. Other season highlights include a performance of Adams’s 2017 Chamber Concerto with violinist Karen Gomyo and the release of a new record featuring the Chicago-based Spektral Quartet.
Adams was Mead Composer In Residence with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra from 2015 to 2018 and in the 2021-22 season was the Composer in Residence with Het Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. He has held residencies at Civitella Ranieri (Umbria, IT), Djerassi Resident Artists Program (California, USA), Ucross (Wyoming, USA), and Visby International Centre for Composers (Gotland, SE). He is a 2019 Guggenheim Fellow and lives and works in Seattle, WA.
Indian-American composer Reena Esmail works between the worlds of Indian and Western classical music, and brings communities together through the creation of equitable musical spaces.
Esmail’s life and music was profiled on Season 3 of PBS Great Performances series Now Hear This, as well as Frame of Mind, a podcast from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Esmail divides her attention evenly between orchestral, chamber and choral work. She has written commissions for ensembles including the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Seattle Symphony, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and Kronos Quartet, and her music has featured on multiple Grammy-nominated albums, including The Singing Guitar by Conspirare, BRUITS by Imani Winds, and Healing Modes by Brooklyn Rider. Many of her choral works are published by Oxford University Press.
Esmail is the Los Angeles Master Chorale’s 2020-2025 Swan Family Artist in Residence, and was Seattle Symphony’s 2020-21 Composer-in-Residence. She also holds awards/fellowships from United States Artists, the S&R Foundation, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Kennedy Center.
Esmail holds degrees in composition from The Juilliard School (BM’05) and the Yale School of Music (MM’11, MMA’14, DMA’18). Her primary teachers have included Susan Botti, Aaron Jay Kernis, Christopher Theofanidis, Christopher Rouse and Samuel Adler. She received a Fulbright-Nehru grant to study Hindustani music in India. Her Hindustani music teachers include Srimati Lakshmi Shankar and Gaurav Mazumdar, and she currently studies and collaborates with Saili Oak. Her doctoral thesis, entitled Finding Common Ground: Uniting Practices in Hindustani and Western Art Musicians explores the methods and challenges of the collaborative process between Hindustani musicians and Western composers.
Esmail was Composer-in-Residence for Street Symphony (2016-18) and is currently an Artistic Director of Shastra, a non-profit organization that promotes cross-cultural music connecting music traditions of India and the West.
She currently resides in her hometown of Los Angeles, California.
Sérgio Coelho was born in Portugal where he started learning clarinet and piano at the age of 9. Later he became a freelance musician and instructor in his native country where he performed regularly with the Orchestra Artave, Orchestra APROARTE and the Lisbon Metropolitan Orchestra. He taught at the Academia da Sociedade Filarmónica Vizelense and Escola das Artes do Alentejo Litoral where he maintained his clarinet studio and conducted youth orchestras.
Presently Coelho is a freelance musician in the Los Angeles area and he is the principal clarinet of the American Youth Symphony Orchestra. He performs regularly with orchestras from Los Angeles area such as Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra, Downey Symphony Orchestra, the Los Angeles Sinfonietta and the Dream Orchestra. He was selected to be a substitute for the New World Symphony Orchestra and Runner-up for the Richmond Symphony Orchestra. Lead by passion by motion pictures, he recorded for some movies and television shows such as the Netflix show “Chefs Table”. Coelho demonstrates a great passion for new music.
As a member and founder of the woodwind trio “Sirius Trivium”, he won competitions and performed in festivals like the Harmus Festival in Oporto (2013) and the Festival Internacional de Música de Piantón during the summers of 2013 and 2014, where he performed and taught masterclasses.
Coelho made collaborated with the National Repertory Orchestra Festival and the Eastern Sierra Symphony Festival. In 2018 Coelho was invited to collaborate with the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra (New Zealand) during one month. As a soloist he had the opportunity to perform a solo with the Lisbon Metropolitan Orchestra and the USC Symphony Orchestra. About Coelho’s performance, Chad Lonski from the “Daily Trojan Newspaper” (Los Angeles, CA) described his interpretation of the Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto stating that, “Coelho’s performance was superb, to say the least, showcasing the heights of clarinet proficiency and taking the clarinet to its limits.” As a winner of the American Youth Symphony Concerto Competition, recently Coelho had the opportunity to perform the Corigliano clarinet concerto with this orchestra.
Coelho won prizes in national and international competitions such as: 1st Prize Winner, American Youth Symphony Concerto Competition (2018, USA), Semifinalist of the Jacques Lancelot International Clarinet Competition (2018, Japan), 1st Prize Winner, University of Southern California Concerto Competition (2015, USA), 2nd Prize Winner, Pasadena Showcase House Instrumental Competition (2014, USA), First Prize Winner, Inatel Prize (soloist prize from the Academia Superior de Orquestra da Metropolitana) (2013, Portugal), 3rd Prize Winner of the 8th Saverio Mercadante International Clarinet Competition (2012, Italy).
Coelho graduated with a Master of Music degree in Clarinet Performance at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, CA, studying with Mr. Yehuda Gilad. During his Masters of Music degree he became a fellow of the Latin Grammy Awards Foundation after being selected for a scholarship from this institution. Coelho received his Bachelor of Music degree in Clarinet and Orchestra Performance in the Metropolitan National Academy of Orchestra, Portugal, where he studied with Mr. Nuno Silva.
Currently, he is pursuing an Artist Diploma Degree at the University of Southern California under the tutelage of Mr. Yehuda Gilad.
Conor Hanick
Pianist Conor Hanick is regarded as one of his generation’s most inquisitive interpreters of music new and old whose “technical refinement, color, crispness and wondrous variety of articulation benefit works by any master.” (New York Times) Hanick has recently performed with the San Francisco Symphony, Seattle Symphony, Alabama Symphony, Orchestra Iowa, and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, been presented by the Gilmore Festival, New York Philharmonic, Elbphilharmonie, De Singel, Caramoor, Cal Performances, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, and the Park Avenue Armory, and worked with conductors Esa-Pekka Salonen, Ludovic Morlot, Alan Gilbert, and David Robertson.
A fierce advocate for the music of today, Hanick has premiered over 200 pieces and collaborated with composers ranging from Pierre Boulez, Kaija Saariaho, and Steve Reich, to the leading composers of his generation, including Nico Muhly, Caroline Shaw, Tyshawn Sorey, Samuel Carl Adams, and Anthony Cheung. This season Hanick presents recitals in the US and Europe, including performances with Julia Bullock, Jay Campbell, Joshua Roman, Seth Parker Woods, AMOC (American Modern Opera Company), and the Takt Trio. Hanick also makes his San Francisco Performances debut at Herbst Theater, joins Sandbox Percussion at 92NY, returns to the Aix-en-Provence Festival, and, in Ojai as part of the California Festival, performs a new set of piano etudes by Samuel Carl Adams, whose piano concerto No Such Spring Hanick premiered last year to wide acclaim with the San Francisco Symphony and Esa-Pekka Salonen.
Hanick is the director of Solo Piano at the Music Academy of the West and serves on the faculty of The Juilliard School, Mannes College, and the CUNY Graduate Center.
The epitome of the citizen-artist, Sidney Hopson slams out rhythms, articulates the power of the arts, and defines how culture orgs should act, like no one we’ve ever met. Genius of the dad joke, and aspiring curry-ist, Hopson’s mic is never unmuted at the wrong time on a digital meeting. He’s built a music program in Jordan to deter refugee-artists and their communities from joining regional terror organizations (who sought to exploit their economic vulnerability and despair). He’s designed and co-produced shows that challenged archaic notions of legitimacy and power, and actively worked to develop the platform of a political candidate whom he subsequently voted for. He’s failed over and over and (he reports) “often in rapid succession,” but he’s kept going. Hopson has made music with Peter Eötvös, Adele, Stevie Wonder, Ellen Reid, Garrett McQueen, Rhianna, and John Williams. He’s currently authoring a series of essays on the case for – and against – establishing a U.S. Secretary of Culture, Media, & Sport, developing domestic and foreign arts policy platform proposals for the Biden-Harris Administration, and perfecting his panang curry recipe.
Dylan Mattingly is a composer who creates music which offers ecstatic, transformative experience and provides an opportunity to alter the way we see our world and place within it. Many of Mattingly’s projects exist on a massive scale, the results of a dedication to the pursuit of bringing to life the most meaningful projects in the wild reaches of imagination — wherever that path leads — and building a path for the realization of these dreamworks from the ground up, often across many years. This practice has been informed by the decade-long process of creating, developing, and bringing to life Stranger Love, an ecstatic 6-hour durational opera, which offers a grand celebration of being alive. Stranger Love will see its premiere on May 20, 2023 at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, commissioned by the LA Phil and directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz. At the heart of all of Mattingly’s work is a commitment to joy, and to what Hannah Arendt refers to as amor mundi — an ever-renewing quest to find the capacity to love the world, in the complex totality of its experience.
Mattingly’s music has been described as “gorgeous” by the San Francisco Chronicle, “transcendent” and “the most poignantly entrancing passages of beautiful music in recent memory” by LA Weekly, and “in the pantheon of contemporary American composers” (Prufrock’s Dilemma). Additionally, Mattingly is the Executive and Co-artistic Director of the NYC-based new-music ensemble Contemporaneous. With Contemporaneous, much of his work has focused on creating an opportunity for other composers and musical creators to follow their own wildest dreams, dedicating the resources of the organization to the creation of large-scale new work and allowing artists a path to create the work they most want to create, regardless of scale and conventional practical constraints.
Mattingly’s music has been commissioned and performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Ojai Music Festival, the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, the Berkeley Symphony, the Del Sol String Quartet, Sarah Cahill, Kathleen Supové, the Albany Symphony, Contemporaneous, ZOFO Duet, John Adams, Marin Alsop, and many others. Mattingly was the Musical America “New Artist of the Month” for February 2013 and was awarded the Charles Ives Scholarship by the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2016. Mattingly has held residencies at the Ucross Foundation, Harrison House Music, Arts & Ecology, and holds a B.A. in Classics from Bard College, a B.M. in Music Composition from the Bard College Conservatory of Music, and an M.M. from the Yale School of Music. Mattingly lives in Berkeley, CA with his partner Hannah and dog Oly.
A native of Mumbai, began studying music at the age of 3. A finalist on the popular reality TV series “Zee Marathi SaReGaMaPa,” Oak is a senior disciple of Dr. Ashwini Bhide Deshpande, a leading vocalist of the Jaipur-Atrauli Gharana. Oak won the All India Classical music competition when she was barely 17. She completed her Sangeet Visharad from the Gandharva Mahavidyalaya Mandal and has earned awards including the prestigious Pt.Jasraj Yuva Award, Pt Vasantrao Deshpande Yuva Award, and the Gaanwardhan Award. Her performances have been admired for her meticulous architecture of ‘khayal,’ her systematic and well-crafted raga exploration and impressive command over the ‘laya.’
Oak is also known for her distinguished work in the Indian/Western Classical music crossover space. She has performed with notable western music ensembles including the Albany Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Tonality choir, Salastina Music Society. She has been featured on several albums including ‘Beyond’, ‘American Mirror’, ‘Sing about it’ and ‘KALA’.
Oak serves as the Programs Director of a non-profit organization ‘Shastra’, where she co-hosts the “Composing with Indian Voice” annual workshop in the U.S., and “Raga Meets Symphony” in India. She is also a Vocal Mentor for the non-profit organization Street Symphony in Los Angeles.
A passionate educator, Oak maintains a vocal studio ‘SailiMusic’ where she trains the next generation of upcoming artists and is a frequent guest speaker, panelist and workshop participant at conferences and universities across America. She has presented her work at the Composition in Asia Conference at the University of South Florida, taught master classes at the Salem State University, Smith College in Northampton MA, Kaufmann Music Center NY, and the University of Texas at Austin.
Apart from her musical training, Oak also holds a Master’s Degree in Accountancy and has completed the Chartered Financial Analyst Program by the CFA Institute, USA.
M.A. Tiesenga is an interdisciplinary artist whose practice delves into the intricate interplay of procedure and enaction within collaborative performance contexts, deftly shaping these dynamics through various idioms. Inspired by an affinity for the outdoors and puzzles, Tiesenga draws analogies between these concepts and the art of cartography, illuminating the parallels between a map and a musical score. This exploration opens doors to musically navigate, inhabit, and realize theoretical terrains.
As a composer, interdisciplinary artist, multi-instrumentalist, and improviser, Tiesenga seamlessly merges these creative identities, emphasizing the power of connection in their work. Tiesenga ventures beyond conventional score-making and interpretation, embracing the potential of expanded notation systems. Their lifelong passion for collage, maps, and asemic languages fuels an enchantment with encoding and decoding creative territories, allowing lexical approaches to transform into palpable musical expressions. Within their artistic vision, Tiesenga seeks to convey inner worlds where protocols and rules converge with intuition and mystique.
Tiesenga’s creative collaborations include work with the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Wild Up, Théâtre Musical Tokyo, Long Beach Opera, Kunsthalle for Music, SPEAK Percussion, Dog Star Orchestra, Ensemble Supermusique, and ensembles at the Eastman School of Music, New England Conservatory, California Institute for the Arts, Yale University, and Darmstädter Ferienkurse.
Tiesenga holds an MFA in Experimental Sound Practices and an MFA in Experimental Animation with a Concentration in Integrated Media from California Institute of the Arts, where they studied with Michael Pisaro, Sara Roberts, Eyvind Kang, Alexander Stewart, Pia Borg, and Tom Leeser. Previously, Tiesenga earned a Bachelor of Music from the Eastman School of Music in saxophone performance under the guidance of Dr. Chien-Kwan Lin.
Praised by LA Opus for their “seemingly effortless precision and blend”, the Zelter String Quartet formed in Los Angeles in 2018. Recently, the quartet was awarded First Prize of the 2023 Plowman Chamber Music Competition, as well as being the Gold Prize Winners of the 2021 Chesapeake International Chamber Music Competition. The quartet is comprised of violinists Kyle Gilner and Gallia Kastner, violist Carson Rick, and cellist Allan Hon. In 2019, the Zelter String Quartet was awarded a full scholarship to participate in the St. Lawrence String Quartet Chamber Music Seminar, where they worked with members of the St. Lawrence and Danish String Quartets. They were also invited to participate in the Rencontres Franco-Américaines de Musique de Chambre as part of the USC Thornton School of Music Ofiesh Chamber Music Competition in the Saint-Gildas-des-Bois area of France in 2020. Most recently, they participated in the Juilliard String Quartet Seminar, and the Center for Advanced Quartet Studies at the Aspen Music Festival, where they worked with the Pacifica, Escher, and American String Quartets.
One of the most revered artists of our time, Mitsuko Uchida is known as a peerless interpreter of the works of Mozart, Schubert, Schumann and Beethoven, as well for being a devotee of the piano music of Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, and György Kurtág. She is Musical America’s 2022 Artist of the Year, and a Carnegie Hall Perspectives artist across the 2022/3, 2023/4 and 2024/5 seasons. Her latest recording, of Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations, was released to critical acclaim earlier this year, has been nominated for a Grammy® Award, and won the 2022 Gramophone Piano Award.
She has enjoyed close relationships over many years with the world’s most renowned orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony, London Symphony Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, and – in the US – the Chicago Symphony and The Cleveland Orchestra, with whom she recently celebrated her 100th performance at Severance Hall. Conductors with whom she has worked closely have included Bernard Haitink, Sir Simon Rattle, Riccardo Muti, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Vladimir Jurowski, Andris Nelsons, Gustavo Dudamel, and Mariss Jansons.
Since 2016, Mitsuko Uchida has been an Artistic Partner of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, with whom she is currently engaged on a multi-season touring project in Europe, Japan and North America. She also appears regularly in recital in Vienna, Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, London, New York and Tokyo, and is a frequent guest at the Salzburg Mozartwoche and Salzburg Festival.
Mitsuko Uchida records exclusively for Decca, and her multi-award-winning discography includes the complete Mozart and Schubert piano sonatas. She is the recipient of two Grammy® Awards – for Mozart Concertos with The Cleveland Orchestra, and for an album of lieder with Dorothea Röschmann – and her recording of the Schoenberg Piano Concerto with Pierre Boulez and the Cleveland Orchestra won the Gramophone Award for Best Concerto.
A founding member of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust and Director of Marlboro Music Festival, Mitsuko Uchida is a recipient of the Golden Mozart Medal from the Salzburg Mozarteum, and the Praemium Imperiale from the Japan Art Association. She has also been awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society and the Wigmore Hall Medal, and holds Honorary Degrees from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. In 2009 she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.
I hope this finds you enjoying the pleasures of summer. I have the good fortune to be at the Marlboro Music Festival as I write this, tucked away in a particularly idyllic corner of southern Vermont – which mercifully was spared the worst of the recent torrential rains elsewhere in the state.
I have had the luxury of time to reflect on the recent Festival and find myself immensely grateful for the company we keep, including each one of you who create such a unique and open-hearted community at each Festival.
The 2023 Ojai Festival is now a happy memory to be savored and cherished. We were so fortunate to be in the company of the wondrous Rhiannon Giddens and all the extraordinary artists she brought to create a particularly joyous Festival community. It is next to impossible to single out individual highlights in a Festival full of them. I will only dare mention a few — Rhiannon singing Paul Simon’s American Tune with an eloquence and a to-the-moment timeliness that brought tears to the eyes, the absolutely essential American story of Omar Ibn Said as told in Rhiannon and Michael Abels’ Omar’s Journey, the indelible musical and visual images created by Wu Man, PeiJu Chien-Pott and the Attacca Quartet in a new production of Tan Dun’s Ghost Opera, the encounter with the enormous creativity and fresh voices of the Iranian Female Composers Association, Kayhan Kalhor’s spellbinding artistry, the infectious joy of Seckou Keita, and Francesco Turrisi’s boundless musical imagination in creating the special Early Music program for a Sunday morning. OK, I’ll stop at that as my own list could go on for another 30 or more highlights. If you are so inspired, please write to me with your own list of highlights.
Here at Marlboro, I delight in the company of Mitsuko Uchida, a co-Artistic Director of the Marlboro Music Festival and our Music Director for the 2024 Ojai Festival. Mitsuko, one of the most eloquent and probing musicians of our time, is making a long awaited return next year, joined by the Mahler Chamber Orchestra (who themselves are returning to Ojai since their 2018 visit with Patricia Kopatchinskaja). Her close collaboration with this immensely creative and spirited ensemble is central to her work in recent years, as they have embarked on a multi-year exploration of the Mozart piano concertos together. She explains the importance of their partnership in this video:
MCO & Mitsuko Uchida: A New Chapter
Mitsuko has long been a champion of and mentor to several generations of young musicians at the Marlboro Festival. We will have the good fortune of being joined in Ojai with some of the most gifted artists on the American musical scene — clarinetist Anthony McGill, Brentano String Quartet, soprano Lucy Fitz Gibbon, and violinist Alexi Kenney — all of whom have rich Marlboro history. More about each of them in the months to come.
Prior to coming to Marlboro, I had the pleasure of serving on the jury of the Mahler Conducting Competition in Bamberg, Germany. Marina Mahler, the granddaughter of Gustav Mahler, graced the proceedings as patron of the competition. When I first met Marina some years ago, I started a painstaking description of where and what Ojai is — she interrupted me to tell me that she had attended Ojai Valley School during her most formative years! So, there you have it — a direct link between the legacy of Gustav Mahler and Ojai! We became fast friends with this knowledge of our Ojai ties. I also had the deep pleasure of serving on the jury alongside Barbara Hannigan (2019 Music Director), who continues to light up the musical world wherever she goes. While there, I discovered that Barbara had assembled a very personal playlist for Apple Music, which characteristically documents her wide-ranging imagination and generosity of spirit. She has curated a list of performances by favorite musicians who, in her words, “allow audiences into a ‘heart-to-heart’ connection with whatever music they perform.” In a lovely confluence of Ojai artists, her list includes Rhiannon Giddens!
Finally, a reflection of loss. Kaija Saariaho, who died at the age of 70 in early June, made an indelible impression with her music and her presence at the 2016 Ojai Festival with Peter Sellars. Kaija was a singular creative force in our musical world, writing with a voice that was intensely personal and affecting, a sound world unlike any other composer. She was also a cherished friend to so many of the Festival musicians over the years. We can only be grateful for having her and her music in our lives. To bid farewell, here are the final three movements of her choral work Nuits, Adieux (1991) in a recording released just this month:
Nuits, adieux (Version for 4 Voices) : VIII. Adieu III – IX. Adieu IV – X. Adieu V
We are most fortunate in the company we keep. With thanks and warm greetings,
Sign your child up for a week of music, art, games, and storytelling with Ms. Laura. There is no previous musical experience required. BRAVO Music and Arts Camp is a productive way to expose your child to music for the first time or to develop an existing passion for music over the Summer. Session one has come to a close with 31 students, but it’s not too late to sign up for the second session!
Special thanks to our partners Ojai Parks and Recreation Department and BRAVO volunteers.
When: Dates for the 2026 Summer TBA Ages: 5-15 Fees: $125 + $25 materials fee; scholarships are available, all are welcome!
The Ojai Music Festival offers the world the experience of Libbey Bowl through free, high-quality live streaming. To watch the Live Streams of the 2023 concerts, click the following link:
Welcome to OJAICast, where we pull back the curtain to take a sneak-peek at the upcoming Ojai Music Festival, June 8 to 11, in beautiful Ojai Valley, California. All are welcome here, from newcomers to long-time music fans. In-depth insights and special guests will help introduce this year’s programming and whet your musical appetites for what’s to come with host Emily Praetorius.
Get an inside look at the creative process with our free Virtual Ojai Talks, where we celebrate the intersection of music and ideas with the 2023 Festival artists, composers, innovators, and thinkers. Virtual Talks are free and open to the musically curious!
Nasim Khorassani is an Iranian composer, visual artist, music educator, and founder of MMCiran. She is currently a PhD candidate in Music Composition working with Katharina Rosenberger, Marcos Balter, and Rand Steiger at the University of California San Diego. She studied her second masters’ with Andrew Rindfleisch and Greg D’Alessio at Cleveland State University. The University of Tehran was where she gained her first master’s and studied composition with Mohammad Reza Tafazzoli, Kiawasch Sahebnassagh, and Sara Abazari. Mainly as a self-taught composer, Nasim started composing at eight. However, her works did not receive any performance in Iran until 2016, when she moved to the United States. Since then, Nasim’s works have been performed by No Exit New Music Ensemble, Del Sol String Quartet, Patchwork Duo, Zeitgeist, OCAZEnigma, Loadbang, International Contemporary Ensemble, and Silkroad.
During her life in Iran, she managed to create and organize a group of music students that received the DAAD Study Visit scholarship in 2009 as the first Iranian group. In 2012, she met with Peter Ablinger and Klaus Lang in Tehran and performed their music. In 2013, Nasim became among five selected sound artists from Iran for Iran-UK Sonics residency in London, where she joined various workshops by Keith Rowe and Chris Watson and had her first experimental improvisation with Veryan Weston at Queen Elizabeth Hall. The trip to Germany as her introduction to modern dance expanded throughout her life, influencing the style of music composition she follows today. Nasim has founded a free online music academy, MMCiran, to support Persian students, which is now called and co-founded as MOAASER.
A winner of 2022 Beth Morrison Projects Next Generation competition, an awardee of National Sawdust’s Second International Hildegard Commission, and a 2019 recipient of Opera America’s Discovery Grant, Niloufar Nourbakhsh’s music has been performed at numerous festivals and venues including Carnegie Hall, Mostly Mozart at Lincoln Center, and Direct Current Festival at the Kennedy Center.
A founding member and co-artistic director of Iranian Female Composers Association, Nourbakhsh is a strong advocate of music education and equal opportunities. She is currently co-artistic director of Peabody Conservatory Laptop Orchestra and teaches composition at Longy School of Music of Bard College. Niloufar holds a doctorate degree from Stony Brook University and regularly performs with her Ensemble Decipher.
Praised for his “vocal power and finesse” & “irresistible hijinks,” baritone Andy Papas is sought after for his impeccable musicianship and mastery of comic repertoire. In the 2022-2023 season, Papas is pleased to make his debut with Ojai Music Festival as Owen/Johnson in Omar’s Journey, roles which he recently covered in the Boston Lyric Opera production of Omar.
Also this season, Papas reprises the title role in Don Pasquale with Opera Saratoga and Union Avenue Opera. Last season, he returned to Anchorage Opera in one of his signature roles, Major General Stanley in The Pirates of Penzance, which he also performed with Opera Naples. In 2022 he rejoined Opera Company of Middlebury as John Styx in Orphée aux Enfers, brought his celebrated Doctor Bartolo (Il barbiere di Siviglia) to Pacific Northwest Opera, and reprised his acclaimed Don Magnifico (La Cenerentola) at Fargo-Moorhead Opera. Papas has also sung Bartolo with Union Avenue Opera, Opera Theater of Connecticut, Anchorage Opera, Painted Sky Opera, and covered the role at Boston Lyric Opera. His committed, musically sophisticated performances have consistently earned him praise for “creating a character both sinister and silly,” and for his “rich voiced portrayals… of considerable aplomb.”
Other noteworthy recent engagements for Papas include the Music Master in Ariadne auf Naxos with Vashon Opera, Benoit in La bohème with The Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra, Baron Zeta in The Merry Widow with Opera Saratoga, Pandolfe in Cendrillon with Opera Company of Middlebury; and the title role in Falstaff and Tonio in Pagliacci with Raylynmor Opera.
An accomplished performer on the musical theater stage, Papas has brought his acting prowess to roles such as Bumble in Oliver at New Repertory Theatre and as George/Lord Boxington in My Fair Lady at The Lyric Stage Company of Boston. He has also performed the role of Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof at Music on Norway Pond, and delighted audiences as Chef Louis in The Little Mermaid for Fiddlehead Theater.
Papas can be heard on Bridge Records as Bugs/Gent, which he also performed with Opera Saratoga, on Albany Records as Stephano in the world premiere of composer Joseph Summer’s The Tempest, and on New World Records as part of White Snake Projects recording of The Ouroboros Trilogy: Naga.
Joshua Stauffer is a restless creative who performs music from over four centuries on a variety of plucked instruments. He began his career as an electric guitarist performing jazz and improvised music before transitioning to the classical guitar via contemporary works and chamber music. His diverse musical interests converged when he encountered the theorbo, a large lute that performs primarily basso continuo, or improvised accompaniment, in chamber and orchestral works from the 17th and early 18th centuries.
A keen interest in musical collaboration has taken Stauffer across the U.S. and around the globe, including concerts in Thailand, New Zealand, England, France, Switzerland, and Canada. He is a founding member and the executive director of Time Canvas, an ensemble dedicated to performing early music and new compositions on period instruments. Recent orchestral appearances include Portland Baroque Orchestra, Atlanta Baroque, and Ruckus, and performances as a guest artist at the Juilliard School, The Orchestra Now at Bard College, and the Festival de música de Santa Catarina, Brazil.
He received his Master of Music in historical plucked instruments at The Juilliard School in New York City. Previous studies include a Master of Music in classical guitar in the studio of Jason Vieaux at the Cleveland Institute of Music, and a Bachelor of Music in jazz guitar at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.
Joshua Rubin is a clarinetist and former artistic director of the International Contemporary Ensemble (iceorg.org). As a clarinetist, the New York Times has praised him as “incapable of playing an inexpressive note.” His interest in electronic music has led him to work to make these technologies easier to use for both composers and performers and to build platforms for collective management of ensembles.
He has collaborated with the foremost composers and performers of our time, and this season is featured in performances on modern and on historical clarinets in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Portland, Houston, Geneva, Bergen, and Berlin. He is on the faculty of the New School, Ensemble Evolution, and soundSCAPE Festival in Switzerland, teaching clarinet and electronic music. He maintains an artistic presence in New York and Los Angeles.
Mitchell Carlstrom
Michael Jones
Kosuke Matsuda
Yongyun Zhang
Camilo Zamudio
Steven Schick, director
The New York Times has called red fish blue fish a “dynamic percussion ensemble from the University of California.” Founded more than 25 years ago by Steven Schick, the San Diego–based ensemble performs, records, and premieres works from the last 85 years of western percussion’s rich history. The group works regularly with living composers from every continent. Recent projects include the world premiere of Roger Reynolds’s Sanctuary and the American premiere of James Dillon’s epic Nine Rivers cycle with the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE). In the summer of 2011, red fish blue fish collaborated with George Crumb, Dawn Upshaw, and Peter Sellars to premiere the staged version of The Winds of Destiny. Eighth Blackbird invited red fish blue fish to join them in performances of works by American icons John Cage and Steve Reich at the Park Avenue Armory in New York City. The New York Times called their “riveting” John Cage performance the “highlight” of the program. In 2012 red fish blue fish presented four concerts of percussion music alongside Percussion Group Cincinnati at the John Cage Centennial Festival in Washington, DC, where they performed highlights from Cage’s collection of percussion works.
Recordings of the percussion chamber music of Iannis Xenakis and Roger Reynolds on Mode Records have been praised by critics around the world. Their recording of the early percussion works of Karlheinz Stockhausen received Germany’s award for the best recording of contemporary music in 2015.
red fish blue fish has had impact on new music percussion both by virtue of their many performances and acclaimed recordings, and also through their commitment to research and pedagogy as a resident ensemble at UCSD. The group’s numerous alumni of hold major teaching and artistic positions throughout the world.
Ross Karre is a percussionist, filmmaker, and producer based in Oberlin, OH, and New York City. He is the associate professor of percussion at Oberlin Conservatory. After completing his doctorate in music at UCSD with Steven Schick, Ross formalized his visual studies with a Master of Fine Arts degree. He is a percussionist for the International Contemporary Ensemble, where he was artistic director from 2016 to 2022. He has performed regularly with red fish blue fish, Third Coast Percussion (Chicago), and Yarn/Wire (NYC). He has performed at major festivals all over the world, including the Mostly Mozart Festival (NYC), the Holland Festival (Netherlands), Ojai Music Festival (CA), LA Phil Noon to Midnight, Lucerne Festival, Taipei International Percussion Festival, Big Ears (TN), MONA FOMA (Tasmania), Diskotek (Greenland), and Music Today Biennial (Brazil). Karre’s solo album 10.67 Cycles, featuring the music of Ash Fure and Pauline Oliveros, is available on Bandcamp. His video design work has been presented all over the world in prestigious venues such as the Kulturkirche Liebfrauen Duisburg, Muziekgebouw Amsterdam, BBC Scotland, Western Front, MCA Chicago, the Park Avenue Armory, the Kennedy Center, The Kitchen, Roulette Intermedium, Miller Theatre at Columbia University, and the National Gallery of Art. Karre’s archival documentary and documentation work preserves unique moments in the creative processes of Claire Chase, Pauline Oliveros, Steven Schick, Matthias Kaul, Fritz Hauser, and creative collaborations of Third Coast Percussion, Yarn/Wire, ICE, Mount Tremper Arts, Baryshnikov Arts Center, and the Oberlin Percussion Group.
Nicholas Houfek is an NYC-based lighting designer working in music, dance, and theater. Selected projects include Claire Chase’s Density Project (The Kitchen), International Contemporary Ensemble; Oyá by Marcos Balter (NY Philharmonic, soloist for light); Natalie Merchant; Maya Beiser; Ojai Music Festival; Silkroad Ensemble; Tyshawn Sorey’s Perle Noire directed by Peter Sellars (OMF, Oberon-ART); Marc Neikrug’s A Song by Mahler; Anohni’s She Who Saw Beautiful Things at The Kitchen; Suzanne Farrin’s La Dolce Morte at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, directed by Doug Fitch; George Lewis’s Soundlines featuring Steven Schick and directed by Jim Findlay (Skirball); Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s In The Light of Air; Ash Fure’s The Force of Things (Mostly Mozart); The 39 Steps (Olney Theatre Center). In addition to traditional lighting for live performance, Houfek has been developing a light-organ software interface called the ColorSynth that acts as a link between a performer and their lighting. Houfek has also designed for the Martha Graham Dance Company, Cedar Lake Contemporary Dance, and Ian Spencer Bell Dance; is an ensemble member of the International Contemporary Ensemble, a member of USA829, and a graduate of Boston University.
A hallmark of groundbreaking musical experiences in idyllic Ojai, we welcome Grammy-winning Rhiannon Giddens to lead the 77th edition of our annual Festival. The four-day event includes Omar’s Journey based on Gidden’s new opera Omar and Carlos Simon’s Between Worlds inspired by the works of painter Bill Traylor. Get 15% off tickets when you enter the code CAAM15 at checkout.
The CAAM15 discount code has a 2-ticket minimum and only applies to 2023 Ojai Music Festival tickets. The code will expire on June 12, 2023. Discount codes cannot be applied to ticket orders that have already been purchased. All ticket orders are non-refundable. If you can’t attend a concert, contact the Box Office at least 24 hours prior to the concert start time to turn your tickets into a donation. Contact the Box Office for any other questions or concerns.
Since arriving in the U.K. from Senegal in 1999, Seckou Keita has been on an epic creative journey that has seen him broaden the idiomatic scope of his instrument as well as spread his wings, literally and figuratively. Nicknamed “the Hendrix of the Kora,” he has been celebrated for his ingenious tunings and virtuosity and praised as “one of the finest exponents of the kora.” Performing all over the globe as a solo artist and with his groundbreaking quintet, he has captivated audiences at WOMAD, Hay, Glastonbury, Tokyo Jazz, Chicago World Music Festival, Sydney International, Montreal Jazz Festivals and many more places.
Acclaimed collaborations with numerous jazz, pop, Latin, folk, and classical artists, notably include Damon Albarn & the Africa Express; Welsh harpist Catrin Finch; Cuban pianist Omar Sosa; AKA trio with Italian guitarist Antonio Forcione and Brazilian percussionist Adriano Adewale; Paul Weller and the Folk Collective; The Lost Words: Spell Songs (2019) joined by the words of Robert Macfarlane and artwork of Jackie Morris. Since 2007, he has had several opportunities to perform with classical ensembles including Orchestre National de Bretagne, which has spurred him towards his dream of leading an orchestral work specifically for the kora.
Seckou Keita has released 11 albums as a leader and co-leader. Through this work, he has earned numerous accolades including three Songlines Music Awards, and several BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, including 2019 Musician of the Year. “I don’t know if I’m a folk musician, a jazz, or a world one,” he said at the time. “Forget about categories. My music is just music for the soul.”
Seckou Keita released African Rhapsodies (Claves Records), a work for kora and orchestra arranged by Italian composer and bass player Davide Mantovani and recorded with BBC Concert Orchestra. Directed by Royal Northern College of Music’s Head of Conducting Mark Heron, Keita also invited Mantovani on double bass and his brother, Gambian percussionist (and kora player) Suntou Susso; pride of place was given to the outstanding South African cellist and vocalist Abel Selaocoe.
Emi Ferguson is excited to be back at the 2023 Ojai Music Festival. A 2023 recipient of the Avery Fisher Career Grant, Ferguson can be heard live in concerts and festivals with groups including 2022 Ojai Festival Music Director AMOC* (American Modern Opera Company), the Handel and Haydn Society, the New York New Music Ensemble, and the Manhattan Chamber Players. Her recordings celebrate her fascination with reinvigorating music and instruments of the past for the present. Her debut album, Amour Cruel, an indie-pop song cycle inspired by the music of the 17th-century French court, was released by Arezzo Music in September 2017, spending four weeks on the classical, classical crossover, and world music Billboard charts. Her 2019 album Fly the Coop: Bach Sonatas and Preludes, a collaboration with continuo band Ruckus, debuted at #1 on the iTunes classical charts and #2 on the Billboard classical charts, and was called “blindingly impressive … a fizzing, daring display of personality and imagination” by the New York Times. A passionate chamber musician of works new and old, Ferguson has been a featured performer at the Marlboro, Lucerne, Ojai, Lake Champlain, Bach Virtuosi, and June in Buffalo festivals, often premiering new works by composers of our time. Emi has spoken and performed at several TEDx events and has been featured on media outlets including the Discovery Channel, Amazon Prime, WQXR, and Vox talking about how music relates to our world today. As part of WQXR’s Artist Propulsion Lab, she created the series “This Composer is SICK!” with Max Fine that explored the impact of syphilis on composers Franz Schubert, Bedrich Smetana, and Scott Joplin, in addition to guest hosting WQXR’s Young Artists Showcase. This summer, her book co-written with David and Nicholas Csicsko, Iconic Composers, will be released by Trope Publishing, introducing kids and adults to 50 incredible composers. Born in Japan and raised in London and Boston, she now resides in New York City.
Michael Preacely, an American baritone based in Lexington, KY, has proven himself a rising star on the operatic stage. Over the course of his burgeoning career, he has worked with numerous major and regional opera houses and orchestras in the United States and abroad and has consistently garnered critical acclaim. Preacely’s international career has spanned the globe, having featured performances in Europe, Asia, Russia, and Canada. Domestically, he has been featured with the Cincinnati Opera, Opera Company Philadelphia, Opera Memphis, Kentucky Opera, and Cleveland Opera, rank among the multitude of reputable opera companies with whom he has been featured as a performer. Likewise, he has performed alongside many of the nation’s top leading orchestras — including the Cincinnati Symphony, Detroit Symphony, Hilton Head Symphony, Asheville Symphony, Oakland East Bay Symphony, Memphis Symphony, Hamilton-Fairfield Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Cleveland Pops, Cincinnati Pops, American Spiritual Ensemble, and most recently the American Pops Orchestra.
Alongside his noteworthy stage credits and history of critical acclaim, Preacely has also received a great many accolades, including his reception of awards in the Fritz and Jensen Vocal Competition and the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. Preacely is on faculty at the University of Kentucky as a lecturer in voice. Upcoming engagements include his debut singing the title role of oratorio Elijah with the Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra.
Greensboro, NC, native mezzo-soprano Cheryse McLeod Lewis enjoys a diverse career in opera, musical theater, concert, commercial, print, and voiceover. Lewis made her Spoleto Festival USA debut as The Mother (Fatima) in the world premiere production of Omar in 2022. She also recently reprised her world premiere role at Carolina Performing Arts in February 2023.
Other recent role highlights include Bess Understudy/Ensemble Swing in the first National Broadway Tour of The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess; Girlfriend 3/Congregant 3 in Blue (Seattle Opera); Carmen in Carmen (Asheville Lyric Opera, Capital Opera Raleigh); Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia (Asheville Lyric Opera, Mansfield Symphony, Central Georgia Opera Guild); Hansel in Hansel and Gretel (Connecticut Opera, Greensboro Opera); The Mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors (Opera Carolina, Connecticut Opera); Cinderella’s Stepmother in Into the Woods (Village Theatre); and Annie in Porgy and Bess (Seattle Opera).
Lewis has been a concert soloist with Orchestra Seattle, Kirkland Choral Society, Eugene Concert Choir, Eastern Music Festival, Greensboro Symphony, Master Chorus Eastside and Greensboro Oratorio Society. Recent commercial, print, and voiceover credits include national ads for Amazon, Microsoft, Costco, T-Mobile, and Zillow. In addition to performing, she runs her own company, Premier Vocal Entertainment, that provides top-tier, professional vocal entertainment for year-round events in the greater Seattle area, where she is based. Follow @CheryseMezzo and @PremierVocalEntertainment to learn more.
Rising tenor Limmie Pulliam thrills audiences with his captivating stage presence and his “stentorian, yet beautiful,” sound. Pulliam was praised by the San Francisco Chronicle for his “full-throated vocal power, and intimate lyricism” in his debut at Livermore Valley Opera in Verdi’s Otello.
On December 17, 2022, Pulliam made his Metropolitan Opera debut as Radamès in Verdi’s Aida, which also served as his role debut. He recently reprised the role of Radamès with Tulsa Opera for their 75th anniversary gala concert. Elsewhere during the season, he returns to The Cleveland Orchestra for his first performances as Dick Johnson in Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West, conducted by Franz Welser-Möst. In concert, he debuts with the San Diego Symphony singing Verdi’s Requiem and makes his Carnegie Hall debut performing The Ordering of Moses in collaboration with his alma mater, The Oberlin Conservatory. He also joins pianist Mark Markham for a series of recitals entitled “Make Them Hear You: A Spiritual Journey” and will also be featured on “operatic greatest hits” concerts with the Lincoln Symphony Orchestra and Delta Symphony.
The 2021–22 season was highlighted by his highly anticipated Los Angeles Opera debut as Manrico in Verdi’s Il Trovatore, where he was lauded by the Los Angeles Times for his “healthy, focused, ringing tenor.” He followed that with a successful role debut as Turiddu in Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana with Vashon Opera. Upcoming performances include his company debut with Livermore Valley Opera in the title role of Verdi’s Otello, his company debut in Fort Worth Opera’s A Night of Black Excellence concert, and his rescheduled appearance with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra as the tenor soloist in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. He is set to take the stage again as Verdi’s Otello in his highly anticipated debut with The Cleveland Orchestra.
Future engagements include a mainstage debut as Cavaradossi in Puccini’s Tosca with Madison Opera, and international debuts with the Gewandhausorchester in Leipzig, Germany, in Verdi’s Requiem, and The Vienna Volksopera in Vienna, Austria, in John Adams’ The Gospel According to the Other Mary.
PeiJu Chien-Pott is an internationally acclaimed award-winning contemporary dance artist and choreographer from Taiwan, celebrated particularly for her work as a principal dancer for the Martha Graham Dance Company. Described as “one of the greatest living modern dancers” and “the most dramatically daring and physically chameleon-esque Graham dancer of her generation,” Chien-Pott has interpreted the iconic lead roles of Martha Graham’s repertoire. She holds a BFA in Dance from Taipei National University of the Arts, where she has been honored with “Outstanding Alumni Award.” Chien-Pott has received many prestigious international recognitions, including a Bessie from the NY Dance and Performance Awards; Positano Premia La Danza Leonide Massine for Best Female Contemporary Dancer; an honoree of the Women’s History Month by Hudson County; named by Dance Magazine one of its Best Performers in 2014 and 2017; and received the Capri International Dance Award 2018. Chien-Pott was selected as a young influencer in performing arts by The Generation T List of Asia Tatler in 2018 and 2019; and one of 10 Outstanding Young Persons of Taiwan by Junior Chamber International. She was named one of the Best Dancers of 2021 in Richard Move’s Herstory of the Universe by the New York Times.
Her recent choreography includes Rebirth in collaboration with sculptor Kang Mu-Xiang for Taipei 101; Island, created during the pandemic on commission from the Iron Rose Festival of Taiwan; Unity, completed for the late choreographer Nai-Ni Chen and premiered at the New York Live Arts; Split, commissioned by Periapsis Music and Dance; and she was one of the collaborating choreographers for the evening-length work The Threads Project #1 Universal Dialogues of Buglisi Dance Theater, premiered at the Chelsea Factory. She has recently premiered her work Lion in the City, a hip-hop Chinese Lion Dance for Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company’s Lunar New Year program celebrating the Year of the Water Rabbit. Chien-Pott’s appearance in a short film NALA, directed by British filmmaker and choreographer Darshan Singh Bhuller, has received 10 international film awards.
Chien-Pott was awarded a 2023 choreography fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. She is a faculty member at The Ailey School and Martha Graham School.
Chou Wen-Chung was born in Yantai, China, in 1923, and moved to the United States in 1946. His earliest work, Landscapes, written in 1949, is often cited as the first composition in music history that is independent of either Western or Eastern musical grammar. The piece premiered in 1953 with the San Francisco Symphony, conducted by Leopold Stokowski, and launched the young composer onto a career which steadily gained in momentum over the next two decades.
His unique canon of work, a contemporary expression of the principles of traditional Chinese aesthetics, has had a momentous impact on the development of modern music in Asia and in post-colonial cultures. He exhorted young composers to study their own cultural heritage and warned: “If you don’t know where you came from, how do you know where you are going?” His students represent an international mix of accomplished composers, including the acclaimed Tan Dun, Zhou Long, Chen Yi and Bright Sheng. His vision for the music of the future, however, extends far beyond the preservation of any particular heritage. He foresaw a flourishing of creative output, benefitting from a “confluence” of many cultures, but grounded in an understanding of the history and traditions of each.
Nina Barzegar is an Iranian composer and actress and is currently a DMA student in Composition at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She also has a Bachelor of Piano Performance and a Master of Composition from the University of Tehran in Iran. As a composer, Barzegar writes music for various mediums, from concert music, film scores to tutorial piano compositions. Her compositions are inspired mainly by Iranian classical music, and she usually applies elements of Iranian music in her works.
Michi Wiancko is a versatile and highly imaginative composer, violinist, and collaborator, whose multifaceted creative projects and organizational work prioritize artistic discovery, as well as community resilience and social change.
Recent chamber music commissions include works for Boston Chamber Music Society, Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect, Schubert Club, Accordo, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, East Coast Chamber Orchestra, Anne Akiko Meyers, Ecstatic Music Festival, Aizuri Quartet, Parker Quartet, Friction Quartet, and the Jupiter Quartet, to name a few. She has composed three operas: Murasaki’s Moon (2019), commissioned by Met Live Arts, Onsite opera, and American Lyric Theater; Arkana Aquarium (2021), commissioned by Experiments in Opera; and The Stream (2022) commissioned by Baldwin Wallace and the Cleveland Lyric Theater. Wiancko has also composed music for short and feature-length films, commercials, and for her own band, Kono Michi.
A passionate collaborator, she has been fortunate to work and tour with renowned artists from across a vast musical spectrum: Gabriela Lena Frank, Missy Mazzoli, PaviElle French, Vijay Iyer, Steve Reich, Emily Wells, Laurie Anderson, William Brittelle, Kaoru Watanabe, Qasim Naqvi, Mark Dancigers, Satoshi Takeishi, Mazz Swift, Sandeep Das, Jessie Montgomery, Emanuel Ax, Yo-Yo Ma, Matt Berninger, Dolio the Sleuth, and Rench. A member of Silkroad Ensemble and the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, she has also performed with The Knights, A Far Cry, Mark Morris Dance Group, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Alarm Will Sound, and International Contemporary Ensemble.
Described by Gramophone Magazine as an “alluring soloist with heightened expressive and violinistic gifts,” Wiancko made her violin solo debuts with the New York Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, performed her recital debut in Weill Hall, and released a solo album of new works on New Amsterdam called Planetary Candidate, as well as an album of the complete violin solo works of Émile Sauret on Naxos.
A native of California, she holds degrees from CIM and Juilliard, where she studied with Donald Weilerstein and the late Robert Mann, respectively. In addition to her composition and performing career, Michi Wiancko is director and curator of Antenna Cloud Farm, a music festival, arts retreat, and community organization based in western Massachusetts.
Joshua Rubin is a clarinetist and former artistic director of the International Contemporary Ensemble (iceorg.org). As a clarinetist, the New York Times has praised him as “incapable of playing an inexpressive note.” His interest in electronic music has led him to work to make these technologies easier to use for both composers and performers and to build platforms for collective management of ensembles.
Mitchell Carlstrom
Ross Karre is a percussionist, filmmaker, and producer based in Oberlin, OH, and New York City. He is the associate professor of percussion at Oberlin Conservatory. After completing his doctorate in music at UCSD with Steven Schick, Ross formalized his visual studies with a Master of Fine Arts degree. He is a percussionist for the International Contemporary Ensemble, where he was artistic director from 2016 to 2022. He has performed regularly with red fish blue fish, Third Coast Percussion (Chicago), and Yarn/Wire (NYC). He has performed at major festivals all over the world, including the Mostly Mozart Festival (NYC), the Holland Festival (Netherlands), Ojai Music Festival (CA), LA Phil Noon to Midnight, Lucerne Festival, Taipei International Percussion Festival, Big Ears (TN), MONA FOMA (Tasmania), Diskotek (Greenland), and Music Today Biennial (Brazil). Karre’s solo album 10.67 Cycles, featuring the music of Ash Fure and Pauline Oliveros, is available on Bandcamp. His video design work has been presented all over the world in prestigious venues such as the Kulturkirche Liebfrauen Duisburg, Muziekgebouw Amsterdam, BBC Scotland, Western Front, MCA Chicago, the Park Avenue Armory, the Kennedy Center, The Kitchen, Roulette Intermedium, Miller Theatre at Columbia University, and the National Gallery of Art. Karre’s archival documentary and documentation work preserves unique moments in the creative processes of Claire Chase, Pauline Oliveros, Steven Schick, Matthias Kaul, Fritz Hauser, and creative collaborations of Third Coast Percussion, Yarn/Wire, ICE, Mount Tremper Arts, Baryshnikov Arts Center, and the Oberlin Percussion Group.
Nicholas Houfek is an NYC-based lighting designer working in music, dance, and theater. Selected projects include Claire Chase’s Density Project (The Kitchen), International Contemporary Ensemble; Oyá by Marcos Balter (NY Philharmonic, soloist for light); Natalie Merchant; Maya Beiser; Ojai Music Festival; Silkroad Ensemble; Tyshawn Sorey’s Perle Noire directed by Peter Sellars (OMF, Oberon-ART); Marc Neikrug’s A Song by Mahler; Anohni’s She Who Saw Beautiful Things at The Kitchen; Suzanne Farrin’s La Dolce Morte at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, directed by Doug Fitch; George Lewis’s Soundlines featuring Steven Schick and directed by Jim Findlay (Skirball); Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s In The Light of Air; Ash Fure’s The Force of Things (Mostly Mozart); The 39 Steps (Olney Theatre Center). In addition to traditional lighting for live performance, Houfek has been developing a light-organ software interface called the ColorSynth that acts as a link between a performer and their lighting. Houfek has also designed for the Martha Graham Dance Company, Cedar Lake Contemporary Dance, and Ian Spencer Bell Dance; is an ensemble member of the International Contemporary Ensemble, a member of USA829, and a graduate of Boston University.
