2009.04.03
Festival 21 - A Brief History
On November 9, 2002 Boston Classical Guitar Society Director Nicholas Ciraldo presented the first New Music Festival for the Society. It happened at Wellesley College and featured performances by David Leisner and Duo LiveOak as well as a performance competition of “new music”. There was no move to continue the idea.
On April 20 of 2007, Director David Newsam presented a concert of “The Music of Frank Wallace.” Thirteen performers played songs, a trio, cello and flute duos with guitar, a solo performed by the composer, and culminated with Mi Jardín de Calla for 8 guitars, 2 singers, flute and cello. See the video of this performance here along with more information on the piece. The entire program is here.
When Frank Wallace took the position of Artistic Director in the summer of 2007, he decided to expand the idea of a New Music Festival. So the 2008 New Music Festival became a Homage to the recently deceased Daniel Pinkham. Northeastern University was the host and D’Addario Foundation gave a grant to assist. April 24, 2008 saw performances by artists from New York, Bulgaria, Japan, and Turkey. The most popular event of the days was probably the Member’s Concert. Many local guitarists brought a tremendous variety of styles, all music written within the last ten years (only one was not 21st century music). A one hour concert presented the Music of Daniel Pinkham, also with local artists, as well as the Arc Duo from New York. See a complete description at the BCGS website here.
The event generated great enthusiasm and plans began immediately to make the event an annual affair. With the assistance of the Augustine Foundation, Festival 21 is born, a celebration of all that is new in the wolrd of classical guitar: music, design, pedagogy, artists. April 24-26 at Old South Church in Boston will see a celebration of the great Mexican composer Ernesto García de León with performances by the Maestro, a return to Boston of the great Segovia protege Michael Lorimer, and young Mexican guitarists Pablo Garibay and Dieter Hennings. The Member’s concert will return with Robert Ward, Back Bay Trio, Robert Squires, Daniel Acsadi and Frank Wallace with Duo LiveOak. See our website and previous blogs for more details.
