Join us this July for our 33rd season of concerts!
This summer, Summerfest invites you to step beyond the visible and into the imaginative. Our 2025 season explores the mystical and magical, yet still deeply human, through chamber music that casts spells, chases clouds, invokes memories, and bids poignant farewells. Whether you're discovering rarely heard works or revisiting favorites in new light, these four weeks promise a rich journey into music’s power to enchant, inspire, and transform. Join us as we explore what happens when composers listen closely—to stories, spirits, storms, and each other.
Week 1: Casting a Spell
Our season opens with an incantation—music that conjures mystery and meaning. Marjorie Rusche’s Dreams and Visions sets the tone with its shimmering textures, while Clarice Assad’s The Book of Spells draws listeners into a three-part ritual rooted in love, prosperity, and healing. The week culminates in Edward Elgar’s sweeping Piano Quintet, a work that’s both otherworldly and deeply grounded in personal loss and national memory. It’s a program that asks what music can awaken—within and beyond us.
Week 2: Romantic Threads, Modern Skies
Clouds roll across our second week, both meteorological and emotional. Alyssa Morris’s Cloud Songs gives each movement a weather system of its own, from the featherlight cirrus to the thunder of cumulonimbus. We move from sky to solid ground with Theodor Kirchner’s inventive take on Schumann’s Canonic Etudes, reframing a musical process as a living, breathing trio. And in Louise Farrenc’s dynamic Piano Quintet No. 1, we meet a composer whose brilliant chamber writing merges classical forms with Romantic fire. These works shimmer, brood, and soar, navigating the musical atmosphere.
Week 3: Twilight Impressions
Week three shines with introspection and elegance, beginning with Imogen Holst’s expressive String Trio No. 1—a compact but powerful work from a composer who shaped British music behind and beyond the scenes. Henri Tomasi’s Concert Champêtre brings rustic flair to winds, and Debussy’s beloved Clair de lune floats through Evan Halloin’s luminous arrangement for chamber ensemble. We close with Debussy’s vibrant Danse (Tarantelle styrienne), all syncopated color and graceful chaos.
Week 4: Something Borrowed, Something Blue…
We end our season with music that borrows, blends, and blooms. Guillaume Connesson’s Sextour plays with minimalism and dance in a jubilant toast to the New Year. Charles Koechlin’s Quatre Petites Pièces offer refined snapshots of late Romantic elegance, while Elizabeth Brown’s Blue Minor highlights the personal and meditative with its tender tribute to her father. Finally, Bohuslav Martinů’s buoyant Nonet, written in the final year of his life, evokes folk rhythms and bittersweet nostalgia in equal measure. It’s a week of joy and reflection, of parting gifts and playful nods—a perfect coda to a season that travels far, and deeply.
Week 1: Casting a Spell
Our season opens with an incantation—music that conjures mystery and meaning. Marjorie Rusche’s Dreams and Visions sets the tone with its shimmering textures, while Clarice Assad’s The Book of Spells draws listeners into a three-part ritual rooted in love, prosperity, and healing. The week culminates in Edward Elgar’s sweeping Piano Quintet, a work that’s both otherworldly and deeply grounded in personal loss and national memory. It’s a program that asks what music can awaken—within and beyond us.
Week 2: Romantic Threads, Modern Skies
Clouds roll across our second week, both meteorological and emotional. Alyssa Morris’s Cloud Songs gives each movement a weather system of its own, from the featherlight cirrus to the thunder of cumulonimbus. We move from sky to solid ground with Theodor Kirchner’s inventive take on Schumann’s Canonic Etudes, reframing a musical process as a living, breathing trio. And in Louise Farrenc’s dynamic Piano Quintet No. 1, we meet a composer whose brilliant chamber writing merges classical forms with Romantic fire. These works shimmer, brood, and soar, navigating the musical atmosphere.
Week 3: Twilight Impressions
Week three shines with introspection and elegance, beginning with Imogen Holst’s expressive String Trio No. 1—a compact but powerful work from a composer who shaped British music behind and beyond the scenes. Henri Tomasi’s Concert Champêtre brings rustic flair to winds, and Debussy’s beloved Clair de lune floats through Evan Halloin’s luminous arrangement for chamber ensemble. We close with Debussy’s vibrant Danse (Tarantelle styrienne), all syncopated color and graceful chaos.
Week 4: Something Borrowed, Something Blue…
We end our season with music that borrows, blends, and blooms. Guillaume Connesson’s Sextour plays with minimalism and dance in a jubilant toast to the New Year. Charles Koechlin’s Quatre Petites Pièces offer refined snapshots of late Romantic elegance, while Elizabeth Brown’s Blue Minor highlights the personal and meditative with its tender tribute to her father. Finally, Bohuslav Martinů’s buoyant Nonet, written in the final year of his life, evokes folk rhythms and bittersweet nostalgia in equal measure. It’s a week of joy and reflection, of parting gifts and playful nods—a perfect coda to a season that travels far, and deeply.
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