Eastern Music Festival organizers dissolved that program in the fall, over a contract dispute with musicians. But this summer, it’ll return with a new performance season, and a new name: Eastern Festival of Music.
Music Director Gerard Schwarz led the EMF orchestras for 20 years until the festival’s abrupt end last October. He says he got the news minutes before organizers made the announcement public.
"It was very upsetting, of course, because EMF was one of the great summer music festivals and schools," says Schwarz. "And interesting when you see something go away, then you start to really become aware of how important it was."
Schwarz says the community rallied and built the Eastern Festival of Music from scratch — new board, bylaws, nonprofit status — all within six months.
This summer will feature eight faculty chamber music concerts that will be held on Mondays and Tuesdays. Wednesdays will be special events, like an all-Mozart night featuring concertos for flute, piano, and one for bassoon.
Schwarz says that with 60 music faculty and more than 600 student applications so far, this year’s festival will be very familiar to EMF fans.
"You're going to come to concerts this summer," he says. "It'll be like it's always been. At Guilford College, in Dana Auditorium. A concert every night of the week, starting on the 30th of June, going through until August 1, with some of the great soloists, some of the great young musicians. I mean, it's just, it's a very happy, exciting time for us all."
The Eastern Festival of Music’s opening concert on July 4 is an all-American program including Aaron Copland’s "Appalachian Spring," music by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Ellen Zwilich, and George Gershwin’s "An American in Paris."
