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Chamber Music Northwest’s Summer Festival
Live classical music and laid-back vibes meet at this annual summer festival.
Oregon Arts Watch
Chamber Music Northwest (CMNW) manages an unusual combination: classical music played by musicians of the highest caliber in an informal, intimate setting. Since 1971, chamber musicians have flocked to Southeast Portland’s Reed College to play the great classic repertoire with their friends. Music fans share picnics and wine on the campus lawn before heading indoors to hear the sublime music.
Returning annually, the festival is one of Portland’s rites of summer. The festival returns Thursday, July 1 – Sunday, July 25, 2021, with concerts held daily. View their festival concert guide for a full lineup of events. (CMNW also produces a shorter winter festival in January, but picnics on the lawns of Reed College aren’t involved.)
History of CMNW Summer Festival
The festival was created by violinist Sergiu Luca, who served as artistic director until 1981, when he was replaced by clarinetist David Shifrin. Prior to becoming a professor of music at Yale University and artistic director of the Chamber Music Society at Yale series, Shifrin was artistic director of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center from 1992 to 2004. Those connections have kept the pipeline of excellent musicians flowing to Portland, summer after summer. These include young musicians and ensembles chosen for the Protégé Project, who receive coaching from great musicians before rehearsing and performing with them at the festival.
Over the years, the summer festival has evolved, spreading out from its Reed College base to clubs and concert halls across the city. The music has changed, too, extending to include music from the 20th and 21st centuries, exploring musical Americana like classic jazz standards from artists like Dizzy Gillespie and a composer’s take on 1960s rock-n-roll fantasy.
Classical Music Concerts
Enjoy classical music at these upcoming performances in Portland.
William Byrd Festival
Every August, some of Oregon’s finest choral singers convene to perform the stirring music of England’s greatest Renaissance composer, Shakespeare contemporary William Byrd. The 2022 William Byrd Festival will be taking place from August 5 through August 21. This year’s festival will revolve around the music of Thomas Tallis, featuring Tallis’s seven-voice Mass Puer natus…
Opera a la Cart at Sunday Parkways East Portland
Inspired by Portland’s food cart culture, Opera a la Cart is a mobile performance venue that brings live opera performances directly into the community spaces where people gather. Designed and built by architecture students at Portland State University, the cart features a fold-out stage and a “menu” of operatic specials of the day to be…
Opera a la Cart at Caruthers Park, South Waterfront
Inspired by Portland’s food cart culture, Opera a la Cart is a mobile performance venue that brings live opera performances directly into the community spaces where people gather. Designed and built by architecture students at Portland State University, the cart features a fold-out stage and a “menu” of operatic specials of the day to be…
Ravel’s Boléro and Violinist Augustin Hadelich
In a program inspired by the dynamism of dance, Ravel’s sensuous Boléro offers a kaleidoscope of orchestral color, ending with a feverish intensity sure to bring audiences to their feet. Also, Grammy Award–winning violinist Augustin Hadelich performs Donnacha Dennehy’s Violin Concerto, whose central movement explores transcending life under lockdown.
Strauss and Nielsen
STRAUSS and NIELSEN: HOPE AND THE HUMAN SPIRIT Music Director Laureate Carlos Kalmar leads a program exploring the invincibility of the human spirit. Strauss’s songs of farewell, with their radiant lyricism, offer hope and solace in the autumn of life. At the same time, Nielsen’s thrilling Fourth Symphony looks to transcend the anguish of World…
Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony
Showcasing the vast expressive range of the classical orchestra, Beethoven’s “Eroica” celebrates the power of the human spirit in times of conflict and intolerance. And Creative Chair Gabriel Kahane’s The Right to Be Forgotten explores our digital world, questioning ideas of convenience, privacy, free will, and democracy in the internet era. Program Lera Auerbach: Requiem…
Portland Opera presents Bizet's CARMEN
Seville, Spain: Carmen is a factory worker, free spirit, and the toast of the town. She is brave, beautiful, and independent. She does what she wants. She falls in and out of love. Then, her obsessed ex violently and tragically rejects her choice to move on. With melodic gems like the Habanera and the Toreador…
The Magic of Mozart
A mischievous street musician is given the chance to “be Mozart” in this imaginative concert. Tag along with us and experience the adventures of the legendary composer, with music from The Magic Flute, Don Giovanni, and the “Jupiter” Symphony. ARTISTS TBA, Conductor Magic Circle Mime, Guest Artist Dance West Pacific Youth Choir Pam Mahon, Narrator…
Ravel and More with the Oregon Symphony
Principal Guest Conductor Jun Märkl explores the interplay of memory and music in poignant works by Ravel and Dutilleux that trace the devastating impact of two world wars on European culture. Concertmaster Sarah Kwak performs Prokofiev’s shimmering, dreamlike Violin Concerto No. 1, which contrasts fairytale lightness with brazen savagery. Program Dutilleux: The Shadows of Time…
Bugs Bunny At The Symphony
Warner Bros. presents Bugs Bunny At The Symphony 30th Anniversary Edition Combining more than a dozen iconic Looney Tunes projected on the big screen while the Oregon Symphony plays their classical music-infused original scores live, Bugs Bunny At The Symphony features beloved favorites like What’s Opera, Doc?, The Rabbit of Seville, Baton Bunny, Corny Concerto,…
Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2
Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with Pianist Kirill Gerstein Renowned pianist Kirill Gerstein brings his “intelligent and virtuosic music-making” (Observer) to Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto, a work of soulful melodies and technical fireworks. Framing the program are Tania León’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Stride, an homage to the profound legacy of Susan B. Anthony, and Prokofiev’s nostalgic…
Vivaldi's Four Seasons
From festive birdsong and thunderstorms to harvest celebrations and tranquil snowfall, Vivaldi’s wildly popular Four Seasons represents Baroque music at its most cinematic. Also on the program, the drama and explosive energy of Rodion Shchedrin’s Carmen Suite. Program Vivaldi: Four Seasons Bizet/Schedrin: Carmen Suite Artists TBA, Conductor SooBeen Lee, Violin Oregon Symphony
Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony
A masterwork of rich melody and tender romanticism, Rachmaninoff’s Second Symphony contains some of the composer’s most introspective, heartfelt music. Marin Alsop conducts this audience favorite along with Bernstein’s rowdy Candide Overture and the US premiere of a new concerto for cellist Inbal Segev from Grammy-nominated composer Vijay Iyer. Program Bernstein: Overture to Candide Vijay…
Itzhak Perlman
With the Oregon Symphony Itzhak Perlman, 16-time Grammy Award winner and reigning virtuoso of the violin, returns for a refined program of classical favorites. The evening also features a suite of orchestral highlights from Prokofiev’s ballet Romeo and Juliet, including the iconic “Fight Scene.”
Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony
Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony and Violinist Vadim Gluzman 1/28An emotional journey rife with brilliant melody, Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony is a triumphant reflection on the composer’s struggle with fate. Also, Nordic splendor takes center stage in Sibelius’s patriotic Finlandia and the US premiere of Erkki-Sven Tüür’s latest violin concerto performed by Vadim Gluzman, “one of today’s top…
Emanuel Ax Plays Beethoven
Experience Emanuel Ax’s unsurpassed virtuosity in Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto, presented alongside the composer’s Second Symphony — two early works that find the German master honing his revolutionary musical voice. And Unsuk Chin’s Subito con forza pays homage to Beethoven and the relentless energy that is the hallmark of his music. Program Unsuk Chin: Subito…
Concerto Spectacular with the Oregon Symphony
See some of your favorite Oregon Symphony musicians as they share the spotlight in a marathon of virtuosic concertos spanning four centuries — from Haydn’s spirited Trumpet Concerto and Saint-Saëns’s lushly romantic First Cello Concerto to Copland’s jazz-infused Clarinet Concerto and Andy Akiho’s Seven Pillars for percussion quartet. Program Wolf-Ferrari: Overture to The Secret of…
Carmina Burana
With the ferocious roar of its unforgettable opening, Carl Orff’s exhilarating Carmina Burana has become a cultural phenomenon, arresting audiences with its bawdy celebration of life, love, and renewal. Opening the program is Hindemith’s Mathis der Maler Symphony, its three movements inspired by paintings from Matthais Grünewald’s Isenheim altarpiece. PROGRAM Paul Hindemith: Mathis der Maler:…
Music of (In)Tolerance: from Mendelssohn to Wagner
Ideas of oppression and resilience are woven throughout Wagner’s rarely heard Rienzi Overture and Mendelssohn’s monumental “Reformation” Symphony, a heartfelt work inspired by the composer’s Protestant faith. Visionary pianist-composer Gabriela Montero showcases her astonishing powers in Babel, a portrait of her experience as a human rights activist. PROGRAM Wagner: Overture to Rienzi Gabriela Montero: Babel…
Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto
A “once in a lifetime” talent (Toronto Star), violinist Blake Pouliot brings his signature vigor to Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto, one of the most dazzling showpieces for the instrument. Zemlinsky’s richly orchestrated The Mermaid is a probing psychological work of love lost, written after the composer’s own experience of devastating heartbreak. Program Brahms: Academic Festival Overture…
Peter & the Wolf
Prokofiev’s enchanting children’s work for narrator and orchestra is both a fable about a headstrong boy and, cleverly, an introduction to the instruments of the orchestra. Artists TBA, Conductor Dance West Pacific Youth Choir Pam Mahon, Narrator Oregon Symphony
Mahler's Symphony No. 4
Music Director David Danzmayr leads Mahler’s sunny Fourth Symphony, with its curious sleigh bells, puckish woodwinds, and a moving finale that imagines a child’s awe-inspiring vision of Heaven. Swedish soprano Camilla Tilling enchants with the “purity of her sound” (Gramophone) in both the Mahler and Osvaldo Golijov’s tender, tragic Three Songs. Program Osvaldo Golijov: Three…
Portland Opera presents Dvořák's RUSALKA
In this centuries-old folktale with roots in Slavic mythology, a water nymph falls in love with a prince. With the help of the moon and a witch, she defies her father’s advice-giving up her home and voice to win the prince’s love on dry land. When it doesn’t go as planned, the regretful prince seeks…
Music of Steel & Majesty
Be transported by the silvery sounds of the steel pan as Grammy-nominated composer and percussionist Andy Akiho performs Beneath Lighted Coffers, inspired by the architecture of the Roman Pantheon. Hailed by Schumann as “sheer musical mastery,” Schubert’s Ninth Symphony is the composer’s most exuberant, expansive symphonic statement. PROGRAM Andy Akiho: Beneath Lighted Coffers Schubert: Symphony…
Classical Gershwin with the Oregon Symphony
Steeped in jazz, blues, and ragtime, Gershwin’s Concerto in F Major is a quintessentially American take on the classical concerto, making it the perfect vehicle for the dynamic pianist Aaron Diehl. Shostakovich’s brooding, deeply personal Tenth Symphony pursues great extremes in emotion and orchestral color, from wistful wind solos to menacing marches. PROGRAM Unsuk Chin:…
Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake Suite
Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake Suite and Violinist Simone Lamsma Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake is a masterful marriage of melody and movement, a timeless tale of love and transformation. Artist-in-Residence Simone Lamsma joins the Symphony for Barber’s sublimely romantic Violin Concerto, while composer Gabriela Lena Frank’s Concertino Cusqueño is a vibrant celebration of her Peruvian heritage. PROGRAM Gabriela…
Holst’s The Planets
A triumph of orchestration, Holst’s The Planets conjures vivid portrayals of the mythological deities associated with our solar system, from Mars’ drums of war to Neptune’s ethereal mysticism. Plus, bassist and Creative Alliance member Xavier Foley brings consummate versatility to the stage, performing his For Justice and Peace, a powerful meditation on the legacy of…
Mahler’s Symphony No. 5
The season concludes with Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, a work of vast emotional scope that moves from grief to jubilation and includes the composer’s famous Adagietto — a love song to his future wife, Alma, tenderly scored for strings and harp. Principal Flute Martha Long brings sparkling grace to Mozart’s playful Flute Concerto in G Major….
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