63rd Ojai Music Festival June 11, 2009

OJAI 2009
Thomas W. Morris, artistic director
eighth blackbird, music director

“an electrifying confluence of artists, music, theater and ideas”

Thomas W. Morris, artistic director of the Ojai Music Festival and Ojai’s 2009 music director eighth blackbird announced preliminary programming for the 2009 Ojai Music Festival, which takes place from Thursday, June 11 to Sunday, June 14, 2009.

This season, the four-day Festival, which for six decades has become well known for its fearlessness in championing pioneering musical ideas and personalities, pushes the envelope again with programming that reflects the qualities that have made eighth blackbird a growing musical phenomenon—genre-defying variety in wildly collaborative and visually dramatic presentations.

Mr. Morris and eighth blackbird have gathered many of today’s finest young musicians, ensembles, and composers for what Mr. Morris describes as “a wild and diverse musical party of extraordinary talents.” Among them are freewheeling chamber ensemble Tin Hat; the matchless recorder quartet from Berlin, QNG; American pianist Jeremy Denk; composer Steven Mackey, also performing on electric guitar; and actor/singer Rinde Eckert.

In programming the Festival, eighth blackbird flutist Tim Munro explains, “Variety is important. We talk often about creating a well-balanced meal—not too salty or spicy or sweet—where all elements combine.” The result is a Festival of music that is both fresh and familiar presented with a time-honored Ojai Music Festival aesthetic. A highlight is the world premiere of a work co-commissioned by the Ojai Music Festival—Steven Mackey’s Slide, a concert-length, multidisciplinary, music/theater work about the seduction and manipulation of the American psyche featuring eighth blackbird, Rinde Eckert, and Mr. Mackey. Also featured on the program will be such treasured masterpieces of the repertoire as Bach’s Goldberg Variations performed by Jeremy Denk in his Festival debut, a semi-staged and costumed performance of Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire, and Steve Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians.

The Festival opens and closes with concerts that are distinctively the mark of eighth blackbird. The opening concert includes Thierry De Mey’s Table Music, John Luther Adams’s Dark Waves, Takemitsu’s Rain Tree, and George Crumb’s Music for a Summer Evening. The Festival closes with a four-hour music marathon incorporating all Festival artists in a program that features Steve Reich’s Double Sextet, Lisa Bielawa’s Kafka Songs for violin and singer, and Louis Andriessen’s Workers Union. Several free bonus events, to be announced, are also scheduled; sound sculptor/composer/inventor Trimpin returns with his musically and visually interactive creations; and Ara Guzelimian, dean of The Juilliard School and former artistic director of the Ojai Music Festival, will lead the annual Festival Symposium in discussions of this year’s programming.

The complete 63rd Ojai Music Festival program will be announced in March 2009.

Official Website: http://www.OjaiFestival.org