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Doors open at 5:30 pm
GRAMMY-nominated cellist Matt Haimovitz and brilliant young violinist Chad Hoopes bring their talents to the outdoor stage at Charles Krug.
Haimovitz has been hailed as a “ferociously talented cellist” (New York Times) and a “remarkable virtuoso” (The New Yorker) and has established himself as one of classical music’s most adventurous artists. He performs the world premiere of three works for solo cello: Spring Forward, by acclaimed composer Jake Heggie, Afro-dite by Festival Napa Valley’s Composer in Residence Nia Imani Franklin, and Spring Song by eminent composer Gordon Getty. All three works were written for Haimovitz’s The Primavera Project, a momentous series featuring 81 commissions for solo cello.
Hoopes made his auspicious Festival Napa Valley debut in 2009, at age 14. Now an international soloist, Hoopes returns to perform Vivaldi’s ever-vivid Four Seasons with Festival Orchestra Napa. The musicians will be accompanied by some very special guests: the four Napa County high school students who won the Festival’s Four Seasons of Napa Valley poetry competition. The students will read their original sonnets, written expressly for this concert, bringing Vivaldi’s musical story to life.
Read more about the poetry contest.
Performers
With the 2021 premiere of his operatic film Goodbye, Mr. Chips, composer Gordon Getty adds a fourth opera to his list of compositions, which also includes works for orchestra, chorus, vocal and instrumental soloists, and chamber ensembles. His staged works have been mounted by Leipzig Opera, Welsh National Opera, San Francisco Opera, Los Angeles Opera, and Bolshoi Ballet, while his orchestral repertoire has been recorded and performed by the likes of the San Francisco Symphony under Michael Tilson Thomas, Mikhail Pletnev leading the Russian National Orchestra, and Sir Neville Marriner with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. Getty’s life in music is the subject of Peter Rosen’s 2016 documentary There Will Be Music. Recent honors include the European Culture Prize and an inaugural induction into Opera America’s Hall of Fame. Gordon Getty is a Pentatone artist and his music is published by Rork Music.
Matt Haimovitz is acclaimed for his artistry and as a musical visionary – pushing the boundaries of classical music performance, championing new music and initiating groundbreaking collaborations, all while mentoring an award-winning studio of young cellists at McGill University’s Schulich School of Music in Montreal.
American composer Jake Heggie is best known for Dead Man Walking (2000), the most widely performed new opera of the last 20 years, with a libretto by Terrence McNally, and his critically acclaimed operas Moby-Dick (2010), Three Decembers (2008), and It’s a Wonderful Life (2016), all with libretti by Gene Scheer. In addition to 10 full-length operas and numerous one-acts, Heggie has composed more than 300 art songs, as well as concerti, chamber music, choral, and orchestral works.
Acclaimed by critics worldwide for his “jaw-dropping virtuosity” and magnificent tone, American violinist Chad Hoopes remains one of the most consistent and versatile violinists of his generation. The Washington Post has praised his wide-ranging repertoire and projects as „assured and vivid [… with a] gift for dramatic pacing and a distinctive, convincing sense of poetry [...] [A] sense of lyricism, gripping dramatic flow and intellectual depth…”
As stated by Lindsay Bierman, former chancellor of The University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Nia Imani Franklin is "a remarkable young woman who embodies the power of the arts to enrich and transform lives." Franklin was a recipient of the Kenan Fellowship at Lincoln Center Education, as well as Miss New York 2018 and Miss America 2019. She currently works as a composer and artistic leader, empowering women in music through her organization "Compose Her."
Venue
Charles Krug Winery
