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Ojai Music Festival: Gina Gutierrez, ggutierrez@ojaifestival.org (805) 646-2094
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Thomas W. Morris announces retirement as Artistic Director of the Ojai Music Festival

Following the 2019 Festival with Music Director Barbara Hannigan, Mr. Morris will conclude his distinguished 16-year tenure as the Festival’s Artistic Director

(Ojai November 17, 2017) – Thomas W. Morris has announced his decision to retire as the Ojai Music Festival’s Artistic Director following the 73^rd Festival in 2019, after shaping Ojai’s artistic direction for sixteen years.

Under the creative watch of Mr. Morris, the Ojai Music Festival has been called “a finely calibrated ruckus each spring” (Alex Ross, The New Yorker). Mr. Morris expanded the Festival’s programming boundaries and scope, exploring each music director’s individual perspective, creativity, and artistic communities. Mr. Morris has offered adventurous through-curated programming for each Festival and between Festivals, and audiences have come to anticipate a four-day immersive musical, intellectual, and creative adventure. The Ojai Music Festival, under Mr. Morris, has also expanded its reach beyond Ojai with ongoing partnerships with Cal Performances in Berkeley and the Aldeburgh Festival in England, as well as through live and archival video streaming of performances, which are available on the Festival’s website.

Over the years, Mr. Morris has invited an ever-broadening roster of artists, building connections across musical communities. Music Directors of the Ojai Music Festival who have partnered with Mr. Morris since the start of his tenure in 2004 are Kent Nagano, Oliver Knussen, Robert Spano, David Robertson, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Eighth Blackbird, George Benjamin, Dawn Upshaw, Leif Ove Andsnes, Mark Morris, Jeremy Denk, Steven Schick, Peter Sellars, Vijay Iyer, as well as Patricia Kopatchinskaja and Barbara Hannigan in upcoming Festivals. The Festival has welcomed close collaborators, including John Luther Adams, International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), Claire Chase, George Crumb, Caroline Shaw, Roomful of Teeth, The Bad Plus, Aruna Sairam, Trimpin, George Lewis, Calder Quartet, Mark Morris Dance Group, Tyshawn Sorey, and Kaija Saariaho, among others.  Programming highlights featured in Ojai during Mr. Morris’ tenure include site-specific works and premieres by John Luther Adams – Sila and Inuksuit, world premieres including The Classical Style by Steven Stucky and Jeremy Denk and Slide by Rinde Eckert performed by Eighth Blackbird, and most recently, the world premiere of Trouble by Vijay Iyer, performed by Jennifer Koh.

Mr. Morris continues to expand the footprint of the Ojai Music Festival, most notably with Ojai at Berkeley, the partnership with Cal Performances that is now in its eighth year, and the recently announced partnership with the Aldeburgh Festival in England, based in the acclaimed Maltings Concert Hall and in the town of Snape near Aldeburgh. These partnerships with accompanying co-productions and co-commissions allow the Ojai Music Festival, the Aldeburgh Festival, and Cal Performances to present more complex and creative artistic projects than could be conceived by each partner separately. The Aldeburgh relationship launches in June 2018. 

“Each year, I find new possibilities to meet the demands of our supremely curious audiences. As Ojai has quite a legacy, my job has been to build on the Ojai aesthetic of discovery, adventure and engagement, creating an environment where great artists can experiment, and perhaps enter a new stage in their own artistic development. The rich heritage of this glorious Festival and sublimely beautiful place have a way of melding with great musical personalities, leaving behind lasting impressions,” commented Mr. Morris. “The Festival is an irresistible, exhilarating challenge and my work here has been enormous fun. The decision to finish my work here was a difficult one, but I’m confident it is the right one for Ojai and for me. The timing allows the Festival to find a successor in time to play a central role in all the artistic and institutional planning well through the 75th celebration in 2021 and 2022. For me, sixteen wonderful years in Ojai have led me into previously unanticipated artistic realms. I love the music, the place and the people. Working alongside Ojai’s extraordinary family of artists has been an honor and a privilege.”

Chairman of the Board David Nygren said, “Words are simply insufficient in expressing our deep gratitude for Tom’s innumerable contributions not only to the Festival, but to the entire field. Tom’s delight in the creative process is infectious and with each Festival, he has brought us – audiences and artists alike – along on intensive and transformational artistic journeys. He has fearlessly pushed boundaries of genre and community, and has designed through-curated Festivals rich with adventurous programming, frequent surprises, and lively discussion. In his retirement from Ojai, we will be celebrating his unrivaled creative genius and an entire career of superior artistic expression that has mesmerized hundreds of thousands of people. The Festival is recipient of a lifetime of Tom’s work, connections, creativity, and expressive discipline. Tom’s successor will inherit a brilliant platform on which he or she will continue to build, but for now we hope you will join us as we salute Tom during the upcoming Festivals with music directors Patricia Kopatchinskaja and Barbara Hannigan.” 

Mr. Morris shared his decision with the Festival’s Board of Directors at a recent Board meeting. The Board has begun forming a search committee to secure Mr. Morris’ successor, who will become the Festival’s sixth Artistic Director in its 72^nd year history. 

Thomas W. Morris
Thomas W. Morris was appointed Artistic Director of the Ojai Music Festival starting with the 2004 Festival. As Artistic Director, he is responsible for artistic planning and each year appoints a music director with whom shapes the Festival’s programming. Over Mr. Morris’ tenure, audiences have increased, the scope and density of the Festival has expanded, the collaborative partnership Ojai at Berkeley with Cal Performances at UC Berkeley has started, and a compre-hensive program of video streaming of all concerts has been instituted. Mr. Morris is recognized as one of the most innovative leaders in the orchestra industry and served as the long-time chief executive of both The Cleveland Orchestra and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He is currently active nationally and internationally as a consultant, lecturer, teacher, and writer. Mr. Morris was a founding director of Spring for Music and served as the project’s artistic director. He is currently vice chair of the Board of Directors of the Interlochen Center for the Arts, and he is also an accomplished percussionist.

About the Ojai Music Festival
From its founding in 1947, the Ojai Music Festival has become a place for groundbreaking musical experiences, bringing together innovative artists and curious audiences in an intimate, idyllic setting 75 miles northwest of Los Angeles. The Festival presents broad-ranging programs in unusual ways with an eclectic mix of new and rarely performed music, as well as refreshing juxtapositions of musical styles. The four-day festival is an immersive experience with concerts, free community events, symposia, and gatherings. Considered a highlight of the international music summer season, Ojai has remained a leader in the classical music landscape for seven decades.

Through its unique structure of the Artistic Director appointing an annual Music Director, Ojai has presented a “who’s who” of music including Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Olivier Messiaen, Michael Tilson Thomas, Kent Nagano, Pierre Boulez, John Adams, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, David Robertson, Eighth Blackbird, George Benjamin, Dawn Upshaw, Leif Ove Andsnes, Mark Morris, Jeremy Denk, Steven Schick, Peter Sellars, and Vijay Iyer.  Following Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Ojai will welcome Music Director Barbara Hannigan (2019).

The 72^nd Ojai Music Festival, June 7-10, 2018, will present the dynamic violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja as music director. Praised for her “savage energy” (The Washington Post) and “mesmerizing artistry” (The Strad), Kopatchinskaja’s unbounded musical creativity will be in full force, showcasing her as a soloist, collaborator, and new music advocate. Joining her will be her close artistic collaborators, all of whom are making their Festival debuts: the Berlin-based Mahler Chamber Orchestra in its first extended United States residency, JACK Quartet, composer/pianist Michael Hersch, pianist Markus Hinterhäuser, pianist/harpsichordist Anthony Romaniuk, pianist Amy Yang, composer/sound designer Jorge Sanchez-Chiong, and Kopatchinskaja’s parents, Viktor and Emilia Kopatchinski. For more information on programs and series passes, visit the 2018 Festival Schedule

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On a recent visit to Berlin, Musicologist Christopher Hailey visited the offices of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.  Below, he recounts his conversation with Annette zu Castell, first violinist and founding member; Maggie Coe, Director of Artistic Planning; and Elaine Yeung, Communications Manager.

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Berlin is perhaps Europe’s most resolutely international city, a magnet for enterprising and innovative spirits drawn to its bracing climate and to the forthright, sharp-witted character of its populace. It is therefore no surprise that this bustling city is the headquarters of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, one of the finest, most innovative ensembles performing today. But Berlin is a home base rather than a home, because this orchestra – which describes itself as a “nomadic collective” – is a movable feast. It was founded in 1997 by members of the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra, who wanted to continue to make music together after reaching that orchestra’s age limit. Annette Castell remembers, “Our goal was to maintain that level of excitement, discovery and excellence we had experienced in the Youth Orchestra under Claudio Abbado” (who remained a valued collaborator and made the MCO the core of his Lucerne Festival Orchestra). 

Today the MCO has roughly 45 members from 20 countries who join each other for concerts in a variety of international cities each year. “Creative collaboration lies at the heart of our philosophy and activities,” Annette continues. “That includes finding the right partners,”

Maggie interjects, “Partners – conductors, soloists, presenters – who share the orchestra’s values and enthusiasm.”

“We don’t rehearse in Berlin,” Annette continues, “unless we’re performing here. Rather we meet at each venue, generally for two days of rehearsals followed by concerts on tour.”

The orchestra’s repertory is broad, from the classical canon to world premieres, chamber and orchestral fare to opera. So what is the defining characteristic of the orchestra, of its sound, I ask? And like a shot Annette answers: “Our flexibility! And by that I mean: a responsiveness that grows out of the capacity to work together as a chamber ensemble, to be aware of what everyone else is doing.”

“Not to mention the constant need to adjust to different venues, to a variety of acoustic spaces,” Maggie adds, “this gives the MCO its distinctive personality.”

Annette again: “It was Claudio Abbado who stressed this kind of flexibility, of listening actively and taking individual responsibility.”

To this day, Abbado’s philosophy is still very present in the MCO’s music making: it frequently performs conductor-less concerts, often in programs combining orchestral repertory with chamber music. Some of the orchestra’s major projects have also been play/direct programs, featuring the soloist leading from his/her instrument. When the orchestra once found itself without a conductor for a performance of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, it was precisely this spirit that led the musicians to perform the piece on their own, under the leadership of their concertmaster and without a conductor. 

Rising to new challenges is part of the orchestra’s DNA, what keeps it vibrant. That includes developing close working relationships with, among others, several former Ojai Music Directors: Daniel Harding (1997) was the group’s Music Director for many years before becoming its Conductor Laureate and Mitsuko Uchida (1998) is one of the orchestra’s current artistic partners.

Annette explains, “The idea of having multi-year artistic partners began with our work with [2012 Ojai Music Director] Leif Ove Andsnes. We did a project called Beethoven Journey, involving recordings and performances of all five piano concertos and were surprised, devoting four years to the concertos, to see the way we and Leif Ove evolved, developed together – it was always fascinating to the end.  She adds, “CDs and DVDs are important documents of our work, but the live musical experience is the most important.”

Maggie now: “One outgrowth of the Beethoven Journey was working with deaf and hearing-impaired students through Feel the Music, to introduce them to the world of music to demonstrate other ways in which communication functions apart from hearing.”

 “It relates to the fact that Beethoven himself also lost his hearing Annette points out, “and it shows how musical communication also happens on the visual, visceral and emotional level.”

Elaine adds, “MCO musicians are also keen to share their experience with the next generation of musicians, especially through the MCO Academy – this initiative encompasses coaching, mentoring sessions, workshops and an annual orchestra project involving students from partner institutions from five countries.”

“The MCO’s current collaboration with Patricia Kopatchinskaja grew out of initial encounters which we really enjoyed,” Maggie recalls. “We only enter into long-term partnerships when we’ve worked with an artist and found a special connection. The chemistry has to be right.”

The chemistry was obviously right with Patricia who in 2016 invited the orchestra to join her in Hamburg for a project she called Bye Bye Beethoven (which we’ll hear this year in Ojai). “Patricia was questioning the whole nature of the concert experience,” Annette recalls, “and that was the kind of thinking we enjoy. We share the need to feel challenged, to really learn something new from each project, to engage in artistic dialogue.” 

The MCO is a self-sustaining, resolutely democratic organization governed collectively by its five-member orchestra board and the Berlin-based management team. “It’s a real community,” Elaine insists. “The Members are involved in a variety of tasks in addition to music making: from programming to talking to sponsors and doing interviews to photo and video documentation, and all the players are involved in key decisions.” This included, of course, the decision to participate in this year’s Ojai Festival, with its follow-up concerts in Berkeley and Aldeburgh.

Once that decision was set, Maggie and violist Delphine Tissot were dispatched to the 2017 Ojai Festival to scout the venue and the audience, reporting back to the orchestra during their summer residency in Lucerne. “What we found,” Maggie says, “was the perfect match for our kind of music making. An idyllic venue, a very attentive, interested, and welcoming audience, and an openness to new experiences.”

There will be challenges, of course: performing outdoors, in and around the Ojai Valley, tackling an extraordinary range of repertory (about half of it new, including world premieres), and the concentrated intensity of so many concerts, for both the orchestra and individual players, over a nearly month-long period. “But challenges such as these,” Annette insists, “brought us together in the first place and keep our music making fresh and alive.”

“And in 2018,” Maggie continues, “we celebrate our 21^st year.”

Elaine adds: “In this vein, we are constantly asking ourselves: what does it mean to be an orchestra of the 21^st century? How do we stay relevant and connected to each other? What are our responsibilities, and what do we want to achieve?”

“So the orchestra will celebrate, as is only appropriate, by doing something it has never done before,” concludes Annette – “though without me! My husband [American first violinist Tim Summers] gets to go but our son is still in school and I’ll be here in Berlin.”

So those bright-eyed youth orchestra members of 1997 now have families of their own, but they have lost none of their youthful passion for the musical exploration that brought them together – a passion that now brings them to Ojai.

For more on the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, its members and its activities, visit their witty, informative – (and award-winning) – website: http://www.mahlerchamber.com

The Bravo Program is so very grateful to the Ojai Women’s Fund for all of their support on behalf of the children of the Ojai Valley. This grant will further our goal of having weekly music classes for all kindergarten, first, second, and third graders, now including Sunset Elementary.

In human development we know that imagination, intelligence, and play are the same thing. They strengthen the brain. In music class, the teachers come with us and they get to play. It is an important opportunity for them to observe their children as we create the habit of singing, participation, and cooperation.

Recently we played Bombalalom, which is a word from Brazil meaning “our place of peace and happiness”. We sang the song with the words, and the solfeggio hand signs (do, re, mi, etc.). Sometimes we find a partner and put our hands together with them while we sing. We look into each other’s eyes. Joy sprouts forth! The children raise their hands and offer their own places of peace that have meaning to them. Some children say, “My treehouse”, “In my bed with a book”, “Being with my class”, “On my grandma’s lap”. Then one child raised his hand, and I asked where his Bombabalom place was. He shared very softly, his eyes gazing up to the ceiling, “The whole earth”. An entire class of 6 year-old children sighed, and nodded, and smiled.

Laura Walter
Education Coordinator

MATTHIAS PINTSCHER NAMED 2020 MUSIC DIRECTOR

MUSIC DIRECTORS THROUGH 75TH ANNIVERSARY FESTIVAL INCLUDE

Patricia Kopatchinskaja: 72nd Festival, June 7 to 10, 2018
Barbara Hannigan: 73rd Festival, June 6 to 9, 2019
Matthias Pintscher: 74th Festival, June 11 to 14, 2020
Mitsuko Uchida: 75th Festival, June 10 to 13, 2021

Download PDF Version of Press Release

(OJAI CA) — Ojai Music Festival Artistic Director Thomas W. Morris announced updated Festival Music Director appointments today. Composer/conductor Matthias Pintscher will take the helm as 2020 Music Director for the 74th Festival (June 11 – 14, 2020). Mr. Pintscher is one of the most prominent composers of our time and has an extraordinarily active conducting career. He serves currently as Music Director of the Ensemble Intercontemporain in Paris and as Principal Conductor of the Lucerne Festival Academy. He is active as a teacher both at the Lucerne Festival Academy and at the Juilliard School in New York. His teachers and mentors include two Ojai alumni, Peter Eötvös and Pierre Boulez. As Music Director of the Ojai Music Festival, Mr. Pintscher will follow violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja (2018) and soprano/conductor Barbara Hannigan (2019), and precedes pianist Mitsuko Uchida (2021).

“I have known Matthias since the 1990s both as a composer and conductor, and have always been impressed with his amazing creativity, unbounded energy and endless curiosity”, said Thomas W. Morris. “He is in high demand as a composer with recent works being commissioned by the Lucerne Festival, Chicago Symphony, London Symphony and Cleveland Orchestra, and his conducting career is exploding with regular guest engagements with the world’s greatest orchestras, including this week’s debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Matthias is another natural to be music director of Ojai, and I am confident he will preside over a festival that is engrossing, wide ranging, and full of surprise – consistent with the arc of our artistic planning towards and through the 75th anniversary in 2021 and 2022.”

“It is a tremendous pleasure and incredible honor to be music director for the 2020 Ojai Festival, something I have dreamed about since moving to New York ten years ago,” said Matthias Pintscher. “I feel a combination of joy and responsibility to showcase composers and works that create something like an INVISIBLE BRIDGE between the two continents in which I am living and working: Europe and the USA. I have realized that my role as musical communicator – as composer, conductor, educator, and festival director – is to actively strengthen the interactions and connections between the music of today and its heritage in the US and on the “old continent”. As a European living in New York, I want to explore this INVISIBLE BRIDGE as one of the key elements for my programming of the 2020 Ojai Festival: thoughtful, innovative, loving, provocative, and poetic. Music speaks most directly from human to human, and Ojai is a perfect place to showcase this. I am excited. See you in 2020.”

Initial details for Mr. Pintscher’s 2020 Festival will be announced in June 2019. For complete biographical information on upcoming Ojai Music Festival Music Directors, visit OjaiFestival.org.

Matthias Pinscher, 2020 Music Director
Matthias Pintscher is the Music Director of the Ensemble Intercontemporain and became Principal Conductor of the Lucerne Festival Academy Orchestra at the start of the 16/17 season. He is currently in his eighth year as Artist-in-Association with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra.
In the 17/18 season, Mr. Pintscher makes several significant debuts including with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Berlin Radio Symphony, Finnish Radio Symphony, and the Gulbenkian Orchestra in Lisbon. Pintscher and the Ensemble Intercontemporain bring an ambitious presentation of Pierre Boulez’s Répons to the Park Avenue Armory in New York and perform a number of concerts on tour in London (Royal Festival Hall), Vienna (Konzerthaus), and Cologne (Philharmonie). In addition, they will be joined by alumni of the Lucerne Festival in a special multi-media Messiaen project which will be performed in four cities. Return guest engagements this season include the Los Angeles Philharmonic in both a subscription week and at the Hollywood Bowl, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Utah Symphony, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra (where he premieres Salvatore Sciarrino’s new piano concerto with Jonathan Biss), Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra conducting Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. An enthusiastic supporter of and mentor to students and young musicians, Pintscher will also work with the Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic, culminating in a concert at the Philharmonie.

In the 16/17 season, Pintscher was featured as the inaugural composer-in-residence and artist-in-focus at Hamburg’s new Elbphilharmonie concert hall which opened in January 2017. He took the Ensemble Intercontemporain on tour to Asia and celebrated the orchestra’s 40th anniversary. Other highlights included guest appearances with The Cleveland Orchestra, Dallas Symphony, National Arts Centre Orchestra (Ottawa), Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, and Bayerische Rundfunk, among others. Last season also saw the premiere of Pintscher’s new compositions un despertar, his second cello concerto, performed by Alisa Weilerstein and the Boston Symphony Orchestra under the direction of François-Xavier Roth; and Shirim for baritone and orchestra, with Danish singer Bo Skovhus and the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra led by Christophe Eschenbach.

Matthias Pintscher began his musical training in conducting, studying with Peter Eötvös in his early twenties, during which time composing soon took a more prominent role in his life. He began to divide his time equally between conducting and composing, rapidly gaining critical acclaim in both areas of activity. As composer, Mr. Pintscher’s music is championed by some of today’s finest performing artists, orchestras, and conductors. His works have been performed by such orchestras as the Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, and the Orchestre de Paris. Bärenreiter is his exclusive publisher, and recordings of his compositions can be found on Kairos, EMI, Teldec, Wergo, and Winter & Winter. Mr. Pintscher has been on the composition faculty of the Juilliard School since 2014.

Update on the Thomas Fire
The Ojai Music Festival is deeply grateful for the outpouring of concern and support from our worldwide community after the Thomas Fire raged in the Ojai, Ventura, and Santa Barbara areas. As one of California’s largest wildfires on record, the fire has had a devastating impact on hundreds of thousands of acres and on all those in its path. Thanks to the heroic efforts by firefighters, the overall natural beauty including the town of Ojai, Libbey Bowl, other Festival venues, and area hotels and restaurants were spared, allowing the Festival to proceed as planned. Over time, the Topa Topa Mountains surrounding the Ojai Valley will give rise to new life, and the Festival looks to honor this renewal of hope during the upcoming 2018 Festival with Music Director Patricia Kopatchinskaja.

This Year’s Ojai Music Festival (June 7-10, 2018)
The 72nd Ojai Music Festival, June 7-10, 2018, will present the dynamic violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja as music director. Praised for her “savage energy” (The Washington Post) and “mesmerizing artistry” (The Strad), Ms. Kopatchinskaja’s unbounded musical creativity will be in full force, showcasing her as a soloist, collaborator, and new music advocate. Joining her will be her close artistic collaborators, all of whom are making their Festival debuts: the Mahler Chamber Orchestra in its first extended United States residency, JACK Quartet, composer/pianist Michael Hersch, pianist Markus Hinterhäuser, pianist/harpsichordist Anthony Romaniuk, pianist Amy Yang, composer/sound designer Jorge Sanchez-Chiong, and Ms. Kopatchinskaja’s parents, Viktor and Emilia Kopatchinski. For more information on programs and series passes, visit OjaiFestival.org.

Patricia Kopatchinskaja, 2018 Music Director
Violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja’s versatility shows itself in her diverse repertoire, ranging from baroque and classical often played on gut strings, to new commissions and re-interpretations of modern masterworks. Kopatchinskaja’s 2017/18 season commences with the world premiere of her new project Dies Irae at the Lucerne Festival where she was ‘artiste étoile’. Dies Irae is her second staged program following the success of Bye Bye Beethoven with Mahler Chamber Orchestra in 2016, and uses the theme from the Latin Requiem Mass as a starting point for her new concept featuring music from Gregorian Chant and Early Baroque to Giacinto Scelsi and Galina Ustwolskaja. The North American premiere will take place at the Ojai Festival in June 2018.

Thomas W. Morris, Artistic Director
Thomas W. Morris was appointed Artistic Director of the Ojai Music Festival starting with the 2004 Festival. As Artistic Director, he is responsible for artistic planning and each year appoints a music director with whom shapes the Festival’s programming. During Mr. Morris’ tenure, audiences have increased, the scope and density of the Festival has expanded, the collaborative partnership Ojai at Berkeley with Cal Performances at UC Berkeley has started, a new partnership with England’s Aldeburgh Festival will be initiated this year, and a comprehensive program of video streaming of all concerts has been instituted. Mr. Morris is recognized as one of the most innovative leaders in the orchestra industry and served as the long-time chief executive of both The Cleveland Orchestra and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He is currently active nationally and internationally as a consultant, lecturer, teacher, and writer. Mr. Morris was a founding director of Spring for Music and served as the project’s artistic director. He is currently vice chair of the Board of Directors of the Interlochen Center for the Arts, and he is also an accomplished percussionist. In November, Mr. Morris announced his decision to retire as the Festival’s Artistic Director following the 2019 Festival with Music Director Barbara Hannigan, after shaping Ojai’s artistic direction for sixteen years.

Ojai Music Festival
From its founding in 1947, the Ojai Music Festival has become a place for groundbreaking musical experiences, bringing together innovative artists and curious audiences in an intimate, idyllic setting 75 miles northwest of Los Angeles. The Festival presents broad-ranging programs in unusual ways with an eclectic mix of new and rarely performed music, as well as refreshing juxtapositions of musical styles. The four-day festival is an immersive experience with concerts, free community events, symposia, and gatherings. Considered a highlight of the international music summer season, Ojai has remained a leader in the classical music landscape for seven decades.

Through its unique structure of the Artistic Director appointing an annual Music Director, Ojai has chosen a “who’s who” for the post, including Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Olivier Messiaen, Michael Tilson Thomas, Kent Nagano, Pierre Boulez, John Adams, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, David Robertson, Eighth Blackbird, George Benjamin, Dawn Upshaw, Leif Ove Andsnes, Mark Morris, Jeremy Denk, Steven Schick, Peter Sellars, and Vijay Iyer. Following Patricia Kopatchinskaja in 2018, Ojai will welcome Music Director Barbara Hannigan (2019).

Series Passes for the 2018 Ojai Music Festival (June 7-10)
2018 Festival series passes are available and may be purchased online at OjaiFestival.org or by calling (805) 646-2053. 2018 Ojai Music Festival series passes range from $165 to $925 for reserved seating, and lawn series passes start at $75. Single concert tickets will be available in spring 2018.
Directions to Ojai and Libbey Bowl, as well as information about lodging, concierge services for visitors, and other Ojai activities, are available on the Festival website. Follow Festival updates at OjaiFestival.org, Facebook (Facebook.com/ojaifestival), and Twitter (@ojaifestivals).

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Watch 2018 Music Director, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, explain her vision for the Festival. Audiences can expect innovative staged concerts, premieres of new work, and important works of the past – works that will be given new life.