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The 2020 Festival celebrates Pintscher as composer, conductor, and collaborator; welcomes the residency of his Ensemble intercontemporain (EIC) in its first Ojai appearance; and anticipates the return of the Calder Quartet

Building connections between today’s most progressive composers and those from the past six centuries, the Festival explores the sonic worlds of Matthias Pintscher, seven-time Ojai Music Director Pierre Boulez, and composer Olga Neu-wirth with highlights:

• The 2020 Festival is anchored by Boulez’s Memoriale and sur Incises; the US Premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s Eleanor Suite, as well as performances of her In the realms of the unreal and Aello; the West Coast Premiere of Pintscher’s Nur, plus Uriel, Bereshit, and Rittrato di Gesualdo featured for the first time in Ojai; and programmed alongside works by Bach, Unsuk Chin, Gesualdo, Ligeti, Mahler, Mendelssohn, Mozart, Steve Reich, Schubert, Varèse, and Zappa
• US Premiere of the Genesis Cycle, with World Premiere EIC/Ojai co-commission of the “eighth day” The Flood by Toshio Hosakawa. Curated by Pintscher for EIC’s 40th birthday in 2017, the Genesis Cycle explores the Creation story and features works by composers from different countries, including Mark Andre, Franck Bedrossian, Chaya Czernowin, Joan Magra-né Figuera, Stefano Gervasoni, Toshio Hosakawa, Marko Nikodijevic, and Anna Thorvaldsdottir
• Festival concludes with Free Concert for the Community, including works by Angélica Negrón, Gabriela Ortiz, Copland, and Stravinsky
• 2020 Ojai Music Festival opens with a Preview Concert featuring the US Premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie with Pintscher conducting his Ensemble Intercontemporain and members of IRCAM, in partnership with the LA Philharmonic’s Noon to Midnight at Walt Disney Concert Hall, June 6

The 74th Ojai Music Festival, June 11-14, 2020, celebrates Music Director Matthias Pintscher as composer, conductor, and collaborator, and his commitment to strengthening the interactions and connections between the music of today and seminal works from across the centuries. 

Joining Mr. Pintscher will be the Ensemble intercontemporain (EIC) in its first appearance at the Ojai Music Festival. Mr. Pintscher is Music Director of the EIC, the world’s leading contemporary music ensemble founded by seven-time Ojai Music Director Pierre Boulez. The 2020 Festival welcomes the return of the Calder Quartet and the LA Phil New Music Group, plus the Ojai debuts of mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford, tenor Andrew Staples, and singer/songwriter Della Miles. Matthias Pintscher said, “Since I received the invitation to serve as Music Director for the Ojai Music Festival, I am in an inspiring state of excitement, passion, and curiosity on all imaginable levels. Ojai is truly a magical place that allows all of us to find out more about ourselves. Here we can take risks, be bold, be introspective, and dare to wade towards the unknown, even the big unknown inside ourselves. Working and living in NYC and Paris I naturally wanted to create the vision of building a musical “invisible bridge” between two equally strong musical cultures – how they clash with, and yet complete each other today. It is a journey and it is my privilege to take you by the hand and to walk with you in this beautiful sonic garden where we are all invited to explore and discover together.”

Matthias Pintscher said, “Since I received the invitation to serve as Music Director for the Ojai Music Festival, I am in an inspiring state of excitement, passion, and curiosity on all imaginable levels. Ojai is truly a magical place that allows all of us to find out more about ourselves. Here we can take risks, be bold, be introspective, and dare to wade towards the unknown, even the big unknown inside ourselves. Working and living in NYC and Paris I naturally wanted to create the vision of building a musical “invisible bridge” between two equally strong musical cultures – how they clash with, and yet complete each other today. It is a journey and it is my privilege to take you by the hand and to walk with you in this beautiful sonic garden where we are all invited to explore and discover together.”

Artistic Director Chad Smith commented, “Here in Ojai you will find an oasis of music making of the highest caliber in a relaxing and openhearted environment. Audiences and artists create memorable moments together – moments of discovery and of deep listening, and moments when we realize we are hearing the future of music play out in front of us. This journey, where music of today interconnects to seminal musical moments of our great tradition, requires a bold guide, an imaginative programmer, and an enthusiastic advocate. Therefore, I am thrilled to welcome Matthias Pintscher, one of today’s singular composers and most sought-after conductors, as Music Director. Matthias embodies Ojai’s commitment to adventurous music making and to introducing virtuosic artists to our community. This year we will meet his extraordinary Ensemble intercontemporain. Their arrival is both an exciting first and a powerful connection to Ojai’s storied past. Alongside works by Matthias, Boulez’s provocative and riveting music will be a featured thread across the Festival, as will the music of Olga Neuwirth, one the most brilliant composers of our time.” 

Chad Smith, who serves as Ojai’s Artistic Director for the 2020 Festival, was named in October to the position of CEO for the Los Angeles Philharmonic. As announced last month, Ara Guzelimian will serve as Ojai’s next Artistic Director beginning with the 2021 Festival, following Mr. Smith’s decision to step away from Ojai, given his recent appointment. Details for Mr. Guzelimian’s first Festival – the Ojai Music Festival’s 75th – will be announced in 2020.

Based in Paris, Ensemble intercontemporain is considered one of the leading performance organizations devoted to contemporary new music and was founded in 1976 by former Ojai Music Director Pierre Boulez. Now led by Mr. Pintscher, EIC’s 31 soloists share a passion for 20^th to 21^st century music and collaborate closely with composers of today to explore instrumental techniques and develop projects, which interweave music, dance, theater, film, and the visual arts. EIC last appeared in the US in 2015 for Mr. Pintscher’s inaugural year as their music director. Their last Los Angeles appearance was in 1986 with Pierre Boulez. 

The Calder Quartet, which made its Ojai debut at the 2015 Festival with Music Director Steven Schick and returned in 2016 with Music Director Peter Sellars, will present during the 2020 Festival a thoughtfully balanced mix of new and old works for the Ojai Dawns and Libbey Bowl concerts. The Calder will perform a wide range of works by Olga Neuwirth, Matthias Pintscher, Cage, Schubert, and Ives. Hailed as one of American’s great quartets, the Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet is currently composed of violinists Benjamin Jacobson and Tereza Stanislav, violist Jonathan Moerschel, and cellist Eric Byers. Violinist Tereza Stanislav joined the quartet in 2019, replacing Andrew Bulbrook who was an original member of the quartet. Founded in 1998 at the University of Southern California, the group takes its name from American sculptor Alexander Calder.

Since the first concert in 1981, the LA Phil New Music Group has performed works by some of the sharpest minds in composition. Their Ojai appearance in June 2020 marks a return after nearly two decades, performing Steve Reich’s seminal Tehillim on Friday, June 12.

The 2020 Festival will feature the Ojai debuts of several performers. Singer/songwriter Della Miles, who created the role of Eleanor in the world premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s opera American Lulu at the Komische Oper Berlin in 2012, will reprise her role on opening night, Thursday, June 11, in the Suite for Eleanor. Mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford and tenor Andrew Staples will be the featured soloists in Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde arranged by Glenn Cortese on Sunday, June 14.

Pintscher, Boulez, and Neuwirth
Known as one of today’s foremost composers, Matthias Pintscher will have his works interspersed throughout the 2020 Festival, including Bereshit, Nur, Uriel, and 4° quartetto d’archi Ritratto di Gesualdo. In addition to his music directorship of the Ensemble Intercontemporain founded by Pierre Boulez, Mr. Pintscher’s connection with Boulez was a deeply personal friendship and an interwoven professional path that also included their respective roles with EIC, IRCAM, the Lucerne Festival Academy, and now the Ojai Music Festival. Boulez’s works to be performed by EIC include his sur Incises and Mèmoriale.

 The 2020 Festival also shines a light on the work of the prolific, ingenious, daring, and deeply relevant work of Austrian composer Olga Neuwirth. Three of her major works will be performed during the Festival with EIC, Calder Quartet, and singer/songwriter Della Miles including Suite from Eleanor, which received its premiere in 2015 at the Salzburg Festival. Additional featured music of Ms. Neuwirth during the Festival will include in the realms of the unreal performed by the Calder Quartet and Aello – ballet mécanomorphe with the EIC. 

Prior to the start of the 74^th Festival in Ojai, an Ojai Music Festival Preview Concert at the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight on June 6 will offer the US Premiere of Ms. Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie. Mr. Pintscher will conduct the EIC with members of IRCAM (Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music), also founded by Boulez.

IRCAM is a Paris-based public research center dedicated to both scientific research on sound and the creation and transmission of music. Ms. Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie is inspired by Herman Melville’s descriptions of the Galapagos Islands and the sounds of Venice, the city of islands. The performance, which requires the capacities of an indoor venue, will utilize the full Walt Disney Concert Hall placing musicians throughout the Hall. . Prior to this US concert, Ms. Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas has been performed in Europe, including at the Philharmonie de Paris (2015), the Lucerne Festival (2016), and most recently, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg (2019). This Ojai Preview Concert will be the first appearance of an Ojai program as part of the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight.

Chad Smith commented, “Olga’s spatial work, Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie, is a work of extraordinary imagination and technical brilliance. It is also a deeply affecting work requiring a special acoustic environment – one tailor-made for Walt Disney Concert Hall. With EIC in residence at Ojai, Matthias and I thought a perfect way to kick off the Ojai Music Festival this year was to present Olga’s work at the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight festival.”

The last time Ms. Neuwirth’s works were performed in Ojai was in 2002 with the world premiere of Incidendo/fluido for piano with pianist Marino Formenti. “Thrilling and ingenious, Neuwirth’s works are musically innovative, socially and politically critical and ethically earnest. They are an expression of her convictions and her finely honed sense of justice, capturing almost every conceivable genre and mood: from light to dark, brutal to tender, tragic to comic, real to imagined, social to existential. Olga Neuwirth has at times risked being ostracized by the music world and society in general for what she believes. Yet she does not let this discourage her, but pushes herself to step outside her comfort zone and cut across categories to embrace people and affinities of every imaginable race, age and gender,” wrote Catherine Saxon-Kerkhoff (Berlin 2015) of Ms. Neuwirth. 

The Genesis Cycle
In celebration of the EIC’s 40^th birthday in 2017, Matthias Pintscher curated the Genesis Cycle by inviting seven composers from seven different countries to write a new, approximately ten-minute work capturing one of the seven days of Creation. The pieces reflect the Old Testament’s telling of how the universe came to be, as well as the composers’ own creative process of musical imagination. For the Ojai performance and US premiere, Genesis Cycle will include the world premiere of an eighth day with a new work by Japanese composer Toshio Hosakowa, entitled The Flood. The first seven days comprise works by Mark Andre, Franck Bedrossian, Chaya Czernowin, Joan Magrane Figuera, Stefano Gervasoni, Marko Nikodijevic, and Anna Thorvaldsdottir. This joint project is a compelling panorama of composition in the present day with various stylistic leanings.

Furthering the dialogue between new and old music, the Festival will explore Mr. Pintscher’s interest in Mozart with a performance of the Gran Partita, as well as Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 4, and Gesualdo’s arrangement by Sciarrino.

Free Concert for the Community
The 2020 Ojai Music Festival will culminate on Sunday afternoon with a free concert event for the community at the Libbey Bowl with the Calder Quartet and guest artists. It will feature the music of Angélica Negrón, Gabriela Ortiz, Copland, and Stravinsky. Additional program details will be shared in the spring of 2020.

Ojai Talks
The 2020 Festival begins with Ojai Talks hosted by Ara Guzelimian, who will return as Ojai’s Artistic Director with the 2021 Festival. On Thursday, June 11, a series of discussions will begin with an exploration of the 2020 Festival programming and its connection with the sonic world of Pierre Boulez. More on-site and online dialogue during the 2020 Festival includes Concert Insights, the pre-concert talks at the Libbey Bowl Tennis Courts with Festival artists. Pre-concert interviews with artists are also broadcast through the Festival’s live streaming programs. 

View full 2020 Festival Schedule 
Read 2020 Festival Artists’ Bios 

The 2020 Festival – June 11 to 14 – celebrates Pintscher as composer, conductor, and collaborator; welcomes the residency of his Ensemble intercontemporain (EIC) in its first Ojai appearance; and anticipates the return of the Calder Quartet

Building connections between today’s most progressive composers and those from the past six centuries, the Festival explores the sonic worlds of Matthias Pintscher, seven-time Ojai Music Director Pierre Boulez, and composer Olga Neuwirth with highlights:

• The 2020 Festival is anchored by Boulez’s Memoriale and sur Incises; the US Premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s Eleanor Suite, as well as performances of her In the realms of the unreal and Aello; the West Coast Premiere of Pintscher’s Nur and Uriel, Bereshit, Rittrato di Gesualdo featured for the first time in Ojai; and programmed alongside works by Bach, Unsuk Chin, Gesualdo, Ligeti, Mahler, Mendelssohn, Mozart, Steve Reich, Schubert, Varèse, and Zappa
• US Premiere of the Genesis Cycle, with World Premiere EIC/Ojai co-commission of the “eighth day” The Flood by Toshio Hosakawa. Curated by Pintscher for EIC’s 40th birthday in 2017, the Genesis Cycle explores the Creation story and features works by composers from different countries, including Mark Andre, Franck Bedrossian, Chaya Czernowin, Joan Magrané Figuera, Stefano Gervasoni, Toshio Hosakawa, Marko Nikodijevic, and Anna Thorvaldsdottir
• Festival concludes with a Free Concert for the Community, including works by Angélica Negrón, Gabriela Ortiz, Copland, and Stravinsky
• 2020 Ojai Music Festival Preview Concert features the US Premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie with Pintscher conducting his Ensemble intercontemporain and members of IRCAM, in partnership with the LA Philharmonic’s Noon to Midnight at Walt Disney Concert Hall, June 6

Download press release PDF version 
Link to 2020 Festival schedule 

(November 12, 2019– Ojai, California) – The 74th Ojai Music Festival, June 11-14, 2020, celebrates Music Director Matthias Pintscher as composer, conductor, and collaborator, and his commitment to strengthening the interactions and connections between the music of today and seminal works from across the centuries.

Joining Mr. Pintscher will be the Ensemble intercontemporain (EIC) in its first appearance at the Ojai Music Festival. Mr. Pintscher is Music Director of the EIC, the world’s leading contemporary music ensemble founded by seven-time Ojai Music Director Pierre Boulez. The 2020 Festival welcomes the return of the Calder Quartet and the LA Phil New Music Group, plus the Ojai debuts of mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford, tenor Andrew Staples, and singer/songwriter Della Miles.

Matthias Pintscher said, “Since I received the invitation to serve as Music Director for the Ojai Music Festival, I am in an inspiring state of excitement, passion, and curiosity on all imaginable levels. Ojai is truly a magical place that allows all of us to find out more about ourselves. Here we can take risks, be bold, be introspective, and dare to wade towards the unknown, even the big unknown inside ourselves. Working and living in NYC and Paris I naturally wanted to create the vision of building a musical “invisible bridge” between two equally strong musical cultures – how they clash with, and yet complete each other today. It is a journey and it is my privilege to take you by the hand and to walk with you in this beautiful sonic garden where we are all invited to explore and discover together.”

Artistic Director Chad Smith commented, “Here in Ojai you will find an oasis of music making of the highest caliber in a relaxing and openhearted environment. Audiences and artists create memorable moments together – moments of discovery and of deep listening, and moments when we realize we are hearing the future of music play out in front of us. This journey, where music of today interconnects to seminal musical moments of our great tradition, requires a bold guide, an imaginative programmer, and an enthusiastic advocate. Therefore, I am thrilled to welcome Matthias Pintscher, one of today’s singular composers and most sought-after conductors, as Music Director. Matthias embodies Ojai’s commitment to adventurous music making and to introducing virtuosic artists to our community. This year we will meet his extraordinary Ensemble intercontemporain. Their arrival is both an exciting first and a powerful connection to Ojai’s storied past. Alongside works by Matthias, Boulez’s provocative and riveting music will be a featured thread across the Festival, as will the mu-sic of Olga Neuwirth, one the most brilliant composers of our time.”

Chad Smith, who serves as Ojai’s Artistic Director for the 2020 Festival, was appointed in March 2018 to succeed Thomas W. Morris. As announced last month, Ara Guzelimian has been named as Ojai’s next Artistic Director beginning with the 2021 Festival, following Mr. Smith’s decision to step away from Ojai, given his recent appointment as Chief Executive Officer of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Details for Mr. Guzelimian’s first Festival – the Ojai Music Festival’s 75th – will be announced in 2020.

Based in Paris, Ensemble intercontemporain is considered one of the leading performance organizations devoted to contemporary new music and was founded in 1976 by former Ojai Music Director Pierre Boulez. Now led by Mr. Pintscher, EIC’s 31 soloists share a passion for 20th to 21st century music and collaborate closely with composers of today to explore instrumental techniques and develop projects, which interweave music, dance, theater, film, and the visual arts. EIC last appeared in the US in 2013 for Mr. Pintscher’s inaugural year as their music director. Their last Los Angeles appearance was in 1986 with Pierre Boulez.

The Calder Quartet, which made its Ojai debut at the 2015 Festival with Music Director Steven Schick and returned in 2016 with Music Director Peter Sellars, will present during the 2020 Festival a thoughtfully balanced mix of new and old works for the Ojai Dawns and Libbey Bowl concerts. The Calder will perform a wide range of works by Olga Neuwirth, Matthias Pintscher, Cage, Schubert, and Ives. Hailed as one of American’s great quartets, the Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet is currently composed of violinists Benjamin Jacobson and Tereza Stanislav, violist Jonathan Moerschel, and cellist Eric Byers. Violinist Tereza Stanislav joined the quartet in 2019, replacing
Andrew Bulbrook who was an original member of the quartet. Founded in 1998 at the University of Southern California, the group takes its name from American sculptor Alexander Calder.

Since the first concert in 1981, the LA Phil New Music Group has performed works by some of the sharpest minds in composition. Their Ojai appearance in June 2020 marks a return after nearly two decades, performing Steve Reich’s seminal Tehillim on Friday, June 12.

The 2020 Festival will feature the Ojai debuts of several performers. Singer/songwriter Della Miles, who created the role of Eleanor in the world premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s opera American Lulu at the Komische Oper Berlin in 2012, will reprise her role on opening night, Thursday, June 11, in the Suite for Eleanor. Mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford and tenor Andrew Staples will be the featured soloists in Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde arranged by Glenn Cortese on Sunday, June 14

Pintscher, Boulez, and Neuwirth
Known as one of today’s foremost composers, Matthias Pintscher will have his works interspersed throughout the 2020 Festival, including Bereshit, Nur, Uriel, and 4° quartetto d’archi Ritratto di Gesualdo. In addition to his music directorship of the Ensemble intercontemporain founded by Pierre Boulez, Mr. Pintscher’s connection with Boulez was a deeply personal friendship and an interwoven professional path that also included their respective roles with EIC, IRCAM, the Lucerne Festival Academy, and now the Ojai Music Festival. Boulez’s works to be performed by EIC include his sur Incises and Mèmoriale.

The 2020 Festival also shines a light on the work of the prolific, ingenious, daring, and deeply relevant work of Austrian composer Olga Neuwirth. Three of her major works will be performed during the Festival with EIC, Calder Quartet, and singer/songwriter Della Miles including Suite from Eleanor, which received its premiere in 2015 at the Salzburg Festival. Additional featured music of Ms. Neuwirth during the Festival will include in the realms of the unreal performed by the Calder Quartet and Aello – ballet mécanomorphe with the EIC.

Prior to the start of the 74th Festival in Ojai, an Ojai Music Festival Preview Concert at the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight on June 6 will offer the US Premiere of Ms. Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie. Mr. Pintscher will conduct the EIC with members of IRCAM (Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music), also founded by Boulez.

IRCAM is a Paris-based public research center dedicated to both scientific research on sound and the creation and transmission of music. Ms. Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie is inspired by Herman Melville’s descriptions of the Galapagos Islands and the sounds of Venice, the city of islands. The performance, which requires the capacities of an indoor venue, will utilize the full Walt Disney Concert Hall placing musicians throughout the Hall. Prior to this US concert, Ms. Neuwirth’s Le Encantadas has been performed in Europe, including at the Philharmonie de Paris (2015), the Lucerne Festival (2016), and most recently, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg (2019). This Ojai Preview Concert will be the first appearance of an Ojai program as part of the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight.

Chad Smith commented, “Olga’s spatial work, Le Encantadas o le avventure nel mare delle meraviglie, is a work of extraordinary imagination and technical brilliance. It is also a deeply affecting work requiring a special acoustic environment – one tailor-made for Walt Disney Concert Hall. With EIC in residence at Ojai, Matthias and I thought a perfect way to kick off the Ojai Music Festival this year was to present Olga’s work at the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight festival.”

The last time Ms. Neuwirth’s works were performed in Ojai was in 2002 with the world premiere of Incidendo/fluido for piano with pianist Marino Formenti. “Thrilling and ingenious, Neuwirth’s works are musically innovative, socially and politically critical and ethically earnest. They are an expression of her convictions and her finely honed sense of justice, capturing almost every conceivable genre and mood: from light to dark, brutal to tender, tragic to comic, real to imagined, social to existential. Olga Neuwirth has at times risked being ostracized by the music world and society in general for what she believes. Yet she does not let this discourage her, but pushes herself to step outside her comfort zone and cut across categories to embrace people and affinities of every imaginable race, age and gender,” wrote Catherine Saxon-Kerkhoff (Berlin 2015) of Ms. Neuwirth.

The Genesis Cycle
In celebration of the EIC’s 40th birthday in 2017, Matthias Pintscher curated the Genesis Cycle by inviting seven composers from seven different countries to write a new, approximately ten-minute work capturing one of the seven days of Creation. The pieces reflect the Old Testament’s telling of how the universe came to be, as well as the composers’ own creative process of musical imagination. For the Ojai performance and US premiere, Genesis Cycle will include the world premiere of an eighth day with a new work by Japanese composer Toshio Hosakowa, entitled The Flood. The first seven days comprise works by Mark Andre, Franck Bedrossian, Chaya Czernowin, Joan Magrane Figuera, Stefano Gervasoni, Marko Nikodijevic, and Anna Thorvaldsdottir. This joint project is a compelling panorama of composition in the present day with various stylistic leanings.

Furthering the dialogue between new and old music, the Festival will explore Mr. Pintscher’s interest in Mozart with a performance of the Gran Partita, as well as Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 4, and Gesualdo’s arrangement by Sciarrino.

Free Concert for the Community
The 2020 Ojai Music Festival will culminate on Sunday afternoon with a free concert event for the community at the Libbey Bowl with the Calder Quartet and guest artists. It will feature the music of Angélica Negrón, Gabriela Ortiz, Copland, and Stravinsky. Additional program details will be shared in the spring of 2020.

Ojai Talks
The 2020 Festival begins with Ojai Talks hosted by Ara Guzelimian, who will return as Ojai’s Artistic Director with the 2021 Festival. On Thursday, June 11, a series of discussions will begin with an exploration of the 2020 Festival programming and its connection with the sonic world of Pierre Boulez. More on-site and online dialogue during the 2020 Festival includes Concert Insights, the pre-concert talks at the Libbey Bowl Tennis Courts with Festival artists. Pre-concert interviews with artists are also broadcast through the Festival’s live streaming programs.

Further details for Mr. Pintscher’s 2020 Festival will be announced in the spring. 

Matthias Pintscher, 2020 Music Director
Matthias Pintscher is the Music Director of the Ensemble intercontemporain, the world’s leading contemporary music ensemble, founded by Pierre Boulez. In addition to a robust concert season in Paris, he toured extensively with them throughout Europe, Asia, and the United States this season including concerts in Berlin, Brussels, Russia, and the United States. Known as one of today’s foremost composers, Mr. Pintscher will conduct the premiere of his new work for baritone, chorus, and orchestra, performed by Georg Nigl and the Chorus and Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks at their Musica Viva festival in February 2020.

In the 2019/20 season, Mr. Pintscher makes debuts with the symphony orchestras of Montreal, Baltimore, Houston, Pittsburgh, and with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra at Interlochen. He also makes his debut at the Vienna State Opera conducting the premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s new opera Orlando, and returns to the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin to conduct performances of Beat Furrer’s Violetter Schnee, which he premiered in January 2019. Re-invitations this season include the Cleveland Orchestra, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and Chamber Orchestra of Europe.

Highlights of Mr. Pintscher’s 2018/19 season included serving as the Season Creative Chair for the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, as Artist-in-Residence at the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, and concluding a nine-year term as the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s Artist-in-Association. Last season, Mr. Pintscher made his debuts with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, Rotterdam Phil-harmonic, and the Staatsoper Berlin, and returned to the symphony orchestras of Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, the New York Philharmonic, the New World Symphony in Miami, and the Music Academy of the West. In Europe, he conducted the Scottish Chamber Orchestra at the Edinburgh International Festival and returned to the Orchestre de Paris, Danish Na-tional Symphony Orchestra, and Helsinki Philharmonic. Mr. Pintscher also conducted the premiere of his work Nur, a new concerto for piano and ensemble, performed by Daniel Barenboim and the Boulez Ensemble in January 2018. An enthusiastic supporter of and mentor to students and young musicians, Mr. Pintscher served as Principal Conductor of the Lucerne Festival Academy Orchestra from 2016-2018 and worked with the Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic in their 2017/18 season, culminating in a concert at the Philharmonie.

Matthias Pintscher began his musical training in conducting, studying with Pierre Boulez and Peter Eötvös in his early twenties, during which time composing took a more prominent role in his life. He rapidly gained critical acclaim in both areas of activity, and continues to compose in addition to his conducting career. Mr. Pintscher’s music is championed by some of today’s finest performing art-ists, orchestras, and conductors. His works have been performed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and the Orchestre de Paris, among many others. 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.

Ensemble intercontemporain
In 1976, Pierre Boulez founded the Ensemble intercontemporain with the support of Michel Guy (who was Minister of Culture at the time) and the collaboration of Nicholas Snowman. The Ensemble’s 31 soloists share a passion for 20th to 21st century music. They are employed on permanent contract, enabling them to fulfill the major aims of the Ensemble: performance, creation, and education for young musicians and the public.

Under the artistic direction of Matthias Pintscher, the musicians work in close collaboration with composers, exploring instrumental techniques and developing projects that interweave music, dance, theater, film, video, and visual arts. In collaboration with IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique), the EIC is also active in the field of synthetic sound generation. New pieces are commissioned and performed on a regular basis with the support of the Fondation Meyer.

The EIC is renowned for its strong emphasis on music education: concerts for kids, creative work-shops for students, training programs for future performers, conductors, and composers. Since 2004, the soloists have been tutoring young instrumentalists, conductors and composers in the field of contemporary repertoire at the Lucerne Festival Academy, a several week educational project held by the Lucerne Festival. Resident of the Cité de la musique-Philharmonie de Paris, the Ensemble performs and records in France and abroad, taking part in major festivals worldwide. The Ensemble is financed by the Ministry of Culture and Communication and receives additional support from the Par-is City Council. New commissions by Ensemble intercontemporain are supported by Fondation Meyer.

Chad Smith, Artistic Director
Chad Smith currently serves as Chief Executive Officer of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Association. Prior to his promotion in October 2019, Mr. Smith was Chief Operating Officer for the Association. He held that post for four years and was responsible for the artistic oversight and coordination of the orchestra’s programming, as well as the organization’s marketing, communications and public relations, production, orchestra operations, media, and learning initiatives. His tenure with the orchestra has been defined by his close relationships with Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel and Conductor Laureate Esa-Pekka Salonen; groundbreaking artistic initiatives including the launch of new orchestral series, major multi-disciplinary projects and dozens of festivals; and an unparalleled commitment to composers and the music of today. He has also overseen the launch of many of the organization’s defining learning programs, including YOLA (Youth Orchestra Los Angeles), a program which has provided daily after-school music training to thousands of children in several of L.A.’s underserved communities.

Mr. Smith began his career in 2000 at the New World Symphony, working closely with conductor Michael Tilson Thomas. He first joined the LA Phil in 2002, when he was responsible for planning the orchestra’s Green Umbrella new music series, as well as its classical programming at the Hollywood Bowl. After briefly serving as the New York Philharmonic’s head artistic planner, in 2006 he returned to the LA Phil in the expanded role of Vice President of Artistic Planning, a position he held until being named COO in 2015.

A trustee of the New England Conservatory, he also serves on the advisory board of the Music Academy of the West and is a member of the Executive Committee for the Avery Fisher Artist Program. A native of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, he earned a B.A. in European history from Tufts University, as well as B.M. and M.M. Degrees in vocal performance from the New England Conservatory.

Ojai Music Festival
From its founding in 1947, the Ojai Music Festival has been a hallmark for presenting 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 Festival, which takes place in June, 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 signature structure of the Artistic Director appointing an annual Music Director, Ojai has presented a “who’s who” of music including Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Michael Tilson Thom-as, 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, Vijay Iyer, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Barbara Hannigan, and Matthias Pintscher.

As it approaches its 75th anniversary, Ojai looks toward its future with Ara Guzelimian, whose tenure as Artistic Director will begin following the 2020 Festival.

Series Passes for 2020 Ojai Music Festival
2020 Festival series passes are available and may be purchased online at OjaiFestival.org or by calling (805) 646-2053. Ojai Music Festival series passes range from $205 to $950 for reserved seating and lawn series passes start at $75. Single concert tickets will be available in spring 2020. Tickets for the Ojai Preview Concert at the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight will be available in the spring.

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Press contacts: 
Ojai Music Festival: Gina Gutierrez, ggutierrez@ojaifestival.org (805) 646-2181
National/International: Nikki Scandalios, nikki@scandaliospr.com (704) 340-4094

Tricia & Perry La Marca

First, tell us a little about yourself – what do you do? Do you play an instrument? How many Festivals have you attended?

Perry is a film/TVcomposer and pianist. Tricia has an undergraduate degree in Music and is a former music teacher and current businesswoman. We both attended the Festival in 2019 and 2018.

Question:
How did you first hear about Ojai Music Festival?

We learned of the Festival and its programming from friends/colleagues during their respective University years.

Question:
How would you describe your Ojai experience?

Amazing; sublime; wonderful. In addition to thoroughly enjoying the performances and lectures by world class talent as well as the opportunity to experience esoteric and rarely performed pieces, we were genuinely touched by the community and new friends made. 

Question:
What is the most surprising thing you learned or experienced at the Festival?

I think we were surprised to find such a diverse and down to earth group of Festival regulars. The Ojai family is very different than what you typically experience at classical music events.

Question:
What is your favorite Ojai hangout between concerts – places to eat, visit, see?

We love to eat at Azu and Osteria Monte Grappa. We also love to sample the vinegars and olive oils at Carolina Gramm.

Question:
Any recommendations for a Festival first-timer?

Dive in and embrace the experience.  It’s a lot to see, but you’ll regret it if you miss something. Also, do the pre-concert Suppers in the Park!  It’s a great way to meet festival newcomers and regulars.  

Join us as a subscriber for the 2020 Ojai Music Festival with Music Director Matthias Pintscher!

Under the artistic direction of Matthias Pintscher, Ensemble intercontemporain works in close collaboration with composers, exploring instrumental techniques and developing projects that interweave music, dance, theater, film, video, and visual arts. In collaboration with IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique), the Ensemble Intercontemporain is also active in the field of synthetic sound generation. New pieces are commissioned and performed on a regular basis with the support of the Fondation Meyer.

Last week, Perry and Tricia La Marca gave us their feedback into the Ojai Music Festival advising all of us to “dive in and embrace the experience.”  You can read the full article HERE.

This Week, Lucy McKnight gives us her insight into her festival experience.

First, tell us a little about yourself – what do you do? Do you play an instrument? How many Festivals have you attended? 

I am a composer and singer and a senior at USC Thornton School of Music. I have attended eight Ojai Music Festivals since I was 12 years old.

How did you first hear about Ojai Music Festival?

My parents brought me because I love music and because, at that time, just my older sibling was composing. Now we both compose, and our younger brother composes and arranges jazz music. The Ojai Music Festival has been a huge part of my–and my siblings’–education and growth as listeners, performers, and composers.

How would you describe your Ojai experience?

We dive in and swim around in it. I love the early morning concerts at Besant Hill School, and the large-scale John Luther Adams pieces that involve walking around Libbey Park. I love the satisfying exhaustion of days filled to the brim with music. 

What is the most surprising thing you learned or experienced at the Festival?  

You can fall asleep two feet from Steven Schick and Claire Chase and Sarah Rothenberg! I know because I have done it while they were performing For Phillip Guston, an incredible 4.5 hour long piece by Morton Feldman. It started at 5 am and I lay down with my siblings on the blankets and pillows provided on the floor and drifted gently in and out of sleep. Asleep or awake, it was one of the most beautiful pieces of music I have ever heard.

What is your favorite Ojai hangout between concerts – places to eat, visit, see? 

Bonnie Lu’s diner on Ojai Avenue where they have chicken-fried steak for breakfast! The Ojai Meadows Preserve is a nice place to walk and listen to the birds. Renting bikes at The Mob Shop or Bicycles of Ojai and going on the bike trails down toward Ventura – I try to do that every year.

Any recommendations for a Festival first-timer?

Go to everything. Talk to the people next to you during intermission. Buy or bring a seat cushion, a broad-brimmed serious sun hat and lots of sunscreen. Settle in and open your ears.

OJAI MUSIC FESTIVAL IS NOW ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR THE ARTS MANAGEMENT INTERNSHIP PROGRAM FOR THE 74^th OJAI MUSIC FESTIVAL, JUNE 11 to 14, 2020

Quick link for application: https://dev.ojaifestival.org/intern-program/

“I gained a much larger appreciation for all the effort that is put into this music festival. Being behind the scenes gave the opportunity to learn hands on and actively use the learned skills to see and achieve results.” – Liz Spiller, retail intern

  “Being a part of the Ojai Music Festival Internship Program means being a part of a positive, productive and goal driven team that by any means creates an unforgettable experience for its patrons, donors, staff and interns. You gain a greater appreciation and understanding of how a successful arts organization is operations and grown from year to year.”  – Paul Seitz, live stream intern

“ I loved engaging with creators and audiences alike. The intense passion for and dedication to this small, unique festival from both sides is what makes this experience so special. This festival would also not be what it is without its beautiful setting. Ojai is the perfect birthplace for this amazing blend of history and fresh creativity. – Kathryn Carlson, box office intern

The Ojai Music Festival’s arts management internship program is now accepting applications for the 74h Ojai Music Festival slated for June 11 to 14, 2020  with composer/conductor Matthias Pintscher as music director.  Entering its thirteenth year, the Festival’s sought-after program provides hands-on experiences to college students as they are immersed in areas of production, administration, operations, special events, merchandising, live streaming, marketing, public relations, and box office.

Students from varying fields and walks of life enjoy access to different opportunities which give them new skill sets and experiences that they take with them throughout their careers. The internship program also provides them to interact with leaders in the music industry and create lasting friendships with other students. 

Applicants must be 18 or over and enrolled in a two or four year accredited college. The Festival provides housing for the duration of the internship as well as a stipend.  Applications are due by March 15, 2020.

About the 74^th Ojai Music Festival

The 74th Ojai Music Festival, June 11-14, 2020, celebrates Music Director Matthias Pintscher as composer, conductor, and collaborator, and his commitment to strengthening the interactions and connections between the music of today and seminal works from across the centuries. 

Joining Mr. Pintscher will be the Paris-based Ensemble intercontemporain (EIC) in its first appearance at the Ojai Music Festival. Mr. Pintscher is Music Director of the EIC, the world’s leading contemporary music ensemble founded by seven-time Ojai Music Director Pierre Boulez. The 2020 Festival welcomes the return of the Calder Quartet and the LA Phil New Music Group, plus the Ojai debuts of mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford, tenor Andrew Staples, and singer/songwriter Della Miles.

Known as one of today’s foremost composers, Matthias Pintscher will have his works interspersed throughout the 2020 Festival, including Bereshit, Nur, and Uriel. In addition to his music directorship of the Ensemble Intercontemporain founded by Pierre Boulez, Mr. Pintscher’s connection with Boulez was a deeply personal friendship and an interwoven professional path that also included their respective roles with EIC, IRCAM, the Lucerne Festival Academy, and now the Ojai Music Festival. Boulez’s works to be performed by EIC include his sur Incises and Mèmoriale.

 The 2020 Festival also shines a light on the work of the prolific, ingenious, daring, and deeply relevant work of Austrian composer Olga Neuwirth. Three of her major works will be performed during the Festival with EIC, Calder Quartet, and singer/songwriter Della Miles including Suite from Eleanor, which received its premiere in 2015 at the Salzburg Festival. Additional featured music of Ms. Neuwirth during the Festival will include in the realms of the unreal performed by the Calder Quartet and Aello – ballet mécanomorphe with the EIC. 

BRAVO Imagine Concert

February 7, 2020 at the Ojai Valley School’s Greenberg Center

Sponsored by Ojai Valley School–Barbara Barnard Smith Fund of the Ventura County Community Foundation, and the Ojai Music Festival

The Ojai Music Festival’s BRAVO education program and the Ojai Valley School present the Imagine Concert featuring the Sandhi Indian Ensemble led by Dave Cipriani along with John Stephens, and Leonice Shinneman. This free concert will celebrate the appreciation of the music of Northern India and guide audiences on a journey to learn about the music and its cultural impact.

In addition to free school performances for students of the Ojai Valley Unified School District, there will be a free public concert on Friday, February 7, from 4 to 5pm, at the Ojai Valley School’s Greenberg Center (723 El Paseo Road). This free community concert is made possible by the Ojai Valley School-Barbara Barnard Smith Fund of the Ventura County Community Foundation. No reservations needed for the public performance. For more details, call 805 646 2053.

Sandhi Indian Ensemble:

Dave Cipriani, Indian Slide Guitar
John Stephens, Sarod
Leonice Shinneman, Tabla, Pakhawaj, Tavil (Indian Hand Percussion)

Sandhi Indian Ensemble is made up of 3 outstanding graduates of the California Institute of the Arts North Indian Music Program who want to share their love of this deep and exciting music. The members are busy performers, recording artists and teachers in the Ojai and LA area.

Dave Cipriani is one of the leading exponents of Indian Slide Guitar in America, having previously studied under Indian Slide guitar pioneer Pandit Barun Kumar Pal. 

Learn more about David Cipriani here.

Learn more about the featured instruments here.

For almost 30 years, the Ojai Music Festival’s BRAVO Program has been bringing music to the Ojai community. Through music education to Ojai Valley Public School students, engagement at senior living centers, and free concerts throughout the year, BRAVO makes music an integral, enjoyable, and exciting part of the everyday learning process at any age.

To celebrate Music in the Schools month in March, BRAVO’s Music Van has set out to demonstrate the instruments of the orchestra to elementary students. This year, 50 volunteers will visit 8 public and private schools with a selection of instruments that more than 350 fourth and fifth graders are invited to try out.

Longtime Ojai resident and 2018 Ojai Treasure Lynne Doherty has spearheaded the Music Van for more than 25 years, “The look of delight on a kid who makes a mighty racket on the trombone or coaxes a sweet note from the violin is wonderful to see,” she said. “Music instruction in the schools has suffered from years of budget cuts to the arts, and we are continuing to fill that gap.”

You can’t learn to play the violin without first holding one in your hand and awkwardly finding a note.

The Bridge program is preparing 3rd graders throughout the school district for our annual visits to The Gables of Ojai. Children and adults sing and interact together.

In February, the BRAVO program held its annual Imagine concert at Ojai Valley School. Thanks to a special grant from the Ojai Valley School-Barbara Barnard Smith Fund of the Ventura County Community Foundation, the Imagine concert presented the Sandhi Indian Ensemble in two school performances at the Greenberg Center on the OVS campus. Fourth, fifth and six graders enjoyed world music from the subcontinent of India, with a program featuring the table, Indian slide guitar, sarod, and pakhawaj. Children learned the notes of some Indian scales and how they connect to form melodies. Different and complex rhythm patterns were demonstrated and then combined with melodies. An open and free community presentation at 4pm was well received.

These programs provide a lasting legacy of enduring support for Ojai Valley School’s continued education in world music. Along with related arts, it engenders a broad perspective and appreciation of music from all world cultures. This occurs primarily through live performances of traditional music in major non-Western cultural regions. When possible and suitable, the ancestral cultural heritage of the Ojai community and its students are also focused upon. Thanks to Professor Smith, these funds annually open the doors to an engaging multicultural experience for students, teachers, parents and the community, embodying a true world view of music. Ojai Valley School is indebted to Professor Smith for her foresight and generosity.

For more information on the Ojai Music Festival’s BRAVO programs visit OjaiFestival.org or call 805 646 2094.

Composer, conductor, and creative thinker – John Adams occupies a unique position in the world of American music.  His works, both operatic and symphonic, stand out among contemporary classical compositions for their depth of expression, brilliance of sound, and the profoundly humanist nature of their themes. Over the past 30 years, Adams’ music has played a decisive role in turning the tide of contemporary musical aesthetics away from academic modernism and toward a more expansive, expressive language, entirely characteristic of his New World surroundings. 

Born and raised in New England, Adams learned the clarinet from his father and played in marching bands and community orchestras during his formative years. He began composing at age ten and heard his first orchestral pieces performed while still a teenager. The intellectual and artistic traditions of New England, including his studies at Harvard University and attendance at Boston Symphony Orchestra concerts, helped shape him as an artist and thinker. After earning two degrees from Harvard, he moved to Northern California in 1971 and has since lived in the San Francisco Bay area.

Adams taught at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music for ten years before becoming composer-in-residence of the San Francisco Symphony (1982-85), and creator of the orchestra’s highly successful and controversial “New and Unusual Music” series. Many of Adams’s landmark orchestral works were written for and premiered by the San Francisco Symphony, including Harmonium (1981), Grand Pianola Music  (1982), Harmonielehre (1985) and Absolute Jest (2012).

(Elinore Adams, with the Russ Cole Band in the 1930s)

In 1985, Adams began a collaboration with stage director Peter Sellars that has resulted in three decades of groundbreaking operas and oratorios: Nixon in China (1987), The Death of Klinghoffer (1991), both to libretti by Alice Goodman, El Niño (2000), Doctor Atomic (2005), A Flowering Tree (2006), The Gospel According to the Other Mary (2012) and Girls of the Golden West (2017). Of his first opera, The New Yorker Magazine said, “Not since Porgy and Bess has an American opera won such universal acclaim as Nixon in China.”

Adams has received numerous Grammy awards, many of them for his over thirty releases on Nonesuch Records. In 2017 the Berliner Philharmoniker released The John Adams Edition, a multi-CD and DVD compilation of his music in performances conducted by Rattle, Dudamel, Petrenko, Gilbert and Adams himself.
(Carl Adams, with Ed Murphy and his Orchestra in the 1930s)

A new recording of the complete opera Doctor Atomic, with Adams conducting the BBC Symphony and featuring baritone Gerald Finley and soprano Julia Bullock was released in July, timed to the new Sellars production at the Santa Fe Opera.

Must the Devil Have All the Good Tunes? a new concerto for pianist Yuja Wang, will be premiered in March of 2019 with the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Gustavo Dudamel.

Both Harvard and Yale universities have conferred honorary doctorates on Adams, as have Northwestern University, the Juilliard School and Cambridge University in England. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California honored him with the Governor’s Award for his distinguished service to the arts in his adopted home state. His Violin Concerto won the 1993 Grawemeyer Award, and On the Transmigration of Souls, commissioned by the New York Philharmonic to commemorate the first anniversary of 9/11, received the 2003 Pulitzer Prize in Music.

(John and Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, honorary degree recipients, Yale University, 2014)

Adams’ work for two-pianos, Hallelujah Junction, serves at the opening music in Lucca Guadagnino’s Academy Award-nominated film “Call Me By Your Name.”

John Adams is a much sought-after conductor, appearing with the world’s major orchestras, including the London Symphony Orchestra, the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Berliner Philharmoniker, the Chicago Symphony and the Metroplitan Opera. His programming combines his own works with a wide variety of repertoire ranging from Beethoven, Mozart and Wagner to Ives, Stravinsky, Carter, Zappa, and Ellington.

In the current season Adams returns to the Cleveland Orchestra, the Orchestra of Santa Cecilia in Rome, the Dallas Symphony and the Oslo Philharmonic as well as leading the Juilliard Orchestra and presenting the world premiere of Philip Glass’s Symphony No. 12 with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Since 2009 Adams has held the position of Creative Chair with the Los Angeles Philharmonic where he has been instrumental in the success of that orchestra’s highly creative Green Umbrella new music series.

Through his conducting and commissioning of new works, Adams has become a significant mentor of the younger generation of American composers. The Pacific Harmony Foundation, created with his wife, the photographer Deborah O’Grady, supports commissions and performances of new works and musical education initiatives throughout the country. Adams’ educational activities reach from the local (the John Adams Young Composers program in his hometown of Berkeley, California) to the national and international (the Juilliard School, the Royal Academy of Music, the New World Symphony and the Berliner Phiharmoniker Akadamie).

John Adams is also a highly esteemed and provocative writer. He is a frequent contributor to the New York Times Book Review and has written for The New Yorker and The London Times.  Hallelujah Junction, Adams’s much praised volume of memoirs and commentary on American musical life, won the Northern California Book Award for Creative Nonfiction and was named one of the “most notable books of the year” by The New York Times. The official John Adams website is www.earbox.com.

July 2018

Welcome an Ojai Music Festival artist into your home for ten days? What? Someone we had never met…a total stranger?  Deirdre Daly, Ojai Music Festival Housing Manager, is quite persuasive. Cheryl Armstrong and Mirta Milares said yes.

Every year, the Ojai Music Festival welcomes dozens upon dozens of artists from around the world, each bringing their own artistic insights, talents, and stories as they experience Ojai for the first time. 

Last year, Music Director Barbara Hannigan brought young talent from all across Europe with her Equilibrium Young Artists, a program to further the professional development of distinguished singers early in their professional careers, elevating their total musicianship and discipline, and offering projects with leading orchestras and ensembles. Of course, the Ojai Music Festival was the perfect place to showcase such a program. 

Cheryl Armstrong and Mirta Milares,  Ojai natives and Music Festival attendees, were a bit hesitant at first, but what they saw as an experiment turned into a gift that has continued giving long after the Festival ended when they welcomed singer Fleur Barron into her home. Fleur is a member of Barbara Hannigan’s Equilibrium Young Artists and has toured internationally as a solo artist and opera singer. Hailed as a “charismatic star” by the Boston Globe and as “a knockout performer” by The Times, the British-Singaporean mezzo-soprano is a 2018 HSBC Laureate of the Aix-en-Provence Festival and the recipient of the 2016 Grace B. Jackson Prize from the Tanglewood Music Festival, awarded to one outstanding young singer each year.

“While with us during the Festival, our resident mezzo- soprano, Fleur, regaled us with stories of life in the opera world. She hiked up and down the Ojai trails with us. She sang! We laughed and loved our guest, becoming and remaining proud stage moms.” 

They fast became good friends and last October, Fleur’s charisma, talent and generous soul took to her to Montpellier, France where she performed in Puccini’s Madame Butterfly. Cheryl and Mirta were in attendance.  In February 2021, she will follow her to Arizona where Fleur will star in Bizet’s Carmen.

“We couldn’t be happier that we said yes to hosting a Music Festival artist!”

If you are interested in housing one of our artists for the upcoming 2020 Festival (June 11 to 14, 2020) contact Deirdre Daly. (805) 640-5717 or email info@ojaifestival.org.