The Lakes Area Music Festival presents its second week of concerts for its 13th season at Brainerd’s Gichi-ziibi Center for the Arts.
Featuring an orchestra and soloists drawn from the nation’s top classical music institutions, this packed week of events promises to be an experience audiences won’t want to miss, organizers stated in a news release.
The music festival’s first concert of the week will be titled “Partita” presented at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 4. In this celebration of woodwind instruments, the festival explores the Baroque suite of dances known as the partita. Relish the virtuosity of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Partita for Solo Flute, recomposed and performed by guest flutist Emi Ferguson.
Then be swept away by the dancing interplay of oboes, clarinets, basset horns, bassoons, horns and string bass in the grandest example of the genre: Mozart’s “Gran Partita” Wind Serenade.
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A recital event titled “Of Earth and Spirit” will be 7:30 p.m. Friday, led by artistic adviser and Baroque violinist Chloe Fedor, who was praised by The New York Times for her “lovely, plush, seductive tone.” Audiences won’t want to miss her recital as she showcases the ancient roots of Western classical music, organizers stated. From the twittering of birds to plaintive adagios, Fedor and friends will revel in the wit and pathos of the Baroque style.
Concerts also are planned at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday for a string orchestra program titled “Spring Strings.” This celebration of strings begins with the 1948 magnum opus of Polish composer Grażyna Bacewicz, fusing Baroque passion, classical counterpoint and the expressivity of 20th-century modernism, a news release stated. The fire and fury of this piece then melts into “The Last Spring” from Edvard Grieg’s Elegiac Melodies, where unpretentious themes ponder the countryside’s transition from winter to spring, perhaps for the last time.
The festival will honor its origins with Tchaikovsky’s Souvenir de Florence, the finale piece of the first season, reconstructed here for the rich sonorities of a string orchestra.
All concerts will be at Brainerd’s Gichi-ziibi Center for the Arts and online at the organization's YouTube and Facebook pages. Tickets are free of charge with a suggested donation, and registration is required. To reserve a free seat for any Lakes Area Music Festival events, sign up for a My.LAMF account at my.lakesareamusic.org . For more information, visit lakesareamusic.org or call 218-831-0765 (ASK-LAMF).
Founded in 2009, Lakes Area Music Festival, a nonprofit, connects the nation’s best performers and audiences through excellent classical music and inspiring education. This year, the festival will welcome 150 artists from around the world to collaborate on chamber music, orchestral repertoire and an original opera production.
