Friday, July 14 | 6:30PM
Festival Napa Valley kicks off its 17th season with a celebratory evening featuring two beloved masterpieces and one world premiere. The concert opens with a new work by rising young composer Yang Bao. Spanish guitarist Pablo Sáinz-Villegas takes center stage for Joaquín Rodrigo’s iconic Concierto de Aranjuez. The evening culminates with pianist Alexander Malofeev performing Sergei Rachmaninoff’s lush Piano Concerto No. 2 – a fitting tribute to one of the world’s greatest composers on his 150th Anniversary. Kyle Dickson, 2023 recipient of the Joel Revzen Conducting Fellowship, leads Festival Orchestra Napa.
A selection of artwork created by participants in the Festival's How I See Music workshops will be projected during the performance.
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Festival Orchestra Napa's appearance is made possible through a generous gift from Tatiana and Gerret Copeland, proprietors of Bouchaine Vineyards
Yang Bao is the recipient of the 2023 Maria Manetti Shrem Daniel Brewbaker Composer Prize
Kyle Dickson is the 2023 Joel Revzen Conducting Fellow
How I See Music is a Festival Arts for All program
Performers
Yang Bao is a cross-disciplinary artist, composer and pianist based in New York, classically trained in piano performance at The Juilliard School and New England Conservatory of Music. Bao’s multi-media works create an experiential “synthesis of the arts” that is precise in texture while hypnotizing in motion. Inspired by classical music and post-human minimalism, his sensory-based “physical music” condenses complex emotions into poetic fables. Further enhanced by film and installation, Bao’s works materialize the intangible music into ever-morphing sonic monuments.
Praised as “the soul of the Spanish guitar,” he has become a worldwide sensation known as this generation’s great guitarist. Pablo Sáinz-Villegas has been acclaimed by the international press as the successor of Andrés Segovia and an ambassador of Spanish culture in the world. Since his early debut with the New York Philharmonic under the baton of Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos at Lincoln Center, he has played in more than 40 countries and with orchestras such as the Israel Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the National Orchestra of Spain.
Alexander Malofeev came to international prominence when, in 2014, he won the International Tchaikovsky Competition for Young Musicians at age thirteen. Reviewing the performance, Amadeus noted, “Contrary to what could be expected of a youngster…he demonstrated not only high technical accuracy but also an incredible maturity. Crystal clear sounds and perfect balance revealed his exceptional ability.” Since this triumph, Malofeev has quickly established himself as one of the most prominent pianists of his generation.
American conductor Kyle Dickson is quickly building a reputation as an innovative and compelling presence on the podium. Recipient of the 2021 GPMF Advocate for Arts Award, Dickson is a Salonen Conducting Fellow with the San Francisco Symphony under the guidance of Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen through the Negaunee Conducting Program at the Colburn Conservatory in Los Angeles. In 2021 he became the recipient of the Richard S. Weinert Award from Concert Artists Guild.
Festival Orchestra Napa is an all-star ensemble that brings together principal players from major international orchestras and faculty from renowned colleges and conservatories, together with participants from the Frost School of Festival Napa Valley's Blackburn Music Academy. Centered around a core of Frost School of Music faculty, the orchestra also includes hand-picked musicians from ensembles such as the San Francisco Symphony, MET Opera Orchestra, Dallas Symphony, Houston Symphony, and Atlanta Symphony, among others.
Venue
Charles Krug
