Gstaad Menuhin Festival 2023
Gstaad Menuhin Festival 2023
The Gstaad Menuhin Festival 2023 will be held from 14 July to 2 September 2023 under the title, “Humility”. Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy is on the path of change, but without ever losing sight of the foundation that has created the Festival’s ongoing success since its earliest days: the collaboration with the most exciting artists of the time. The 2023 edition of the Festival is no exception: A carte blanche of four concerts by Swiss pianist Francesco Piemontesi, singers Ute Lemper, Cecilia Bartoli, Pretty Yende and Sonya Yoncheva, violinist Gil Shaham, pianists Yuja Wang, Mitsuko Uchida , Bruce Liu and many more.
Yuja Wang plays Ravel
She is an icon of the pianist scene: This summer, Yuja Wang is travelling to Gstaad with both Ravel Concertos in her luggage. The Concerto in G is the better known of the two, while the Concerto for the Left Hand, once written for the war-disabled Paul Wittgenstein, is less well-known. The evening with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France under Tarmo Peltokoski ends with a third masterpiece: Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition” in an orchestration by ... Ravel!
Cecilia Bartoli in "Tosca" semi-staged performance
The semi-staged production of Puccini’s “Tosca” is the crowning finale of their rich summer season for the musicians of the Gstaad Festival Orchestra. While sharing the stage with some of the most outstanding voices of the present day – we can look forward to Sonya Yoncheva’s “Vissi d'arte” and Riccardo Massi’s “E lucevan le stelle” – the orchestra will encounter one of the most breathtaking dramas in the history of opera under the direction of Domingo Hindoyan.
Ready for something new?
The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra is one of the finest orchestras in the world! Under the baton of Lahav Shani – who caused an absolute sensation at his debut in Gstaad in 2019 with the Rotterdam Philharmonic – the orchestra presents two masterpieces by Brahms that are emblematic of the German composer’s humility in the face of great role models of the past: his Violin Concerto – with Gil Shaham as soloist – and his Symphony No. 1.
Music for The Planet with Patricia Kopatchinskaja
This concert cycle is symbolic of Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy 2023, which is all about change. In the concerts under the banner of “Music for the Planet”, violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja creates a “farewell” in music and images to draw attention to the endangerment of our planet: The programmes range from a collaboration with the Gstaad Festival Orchestra and the young Lithuanian conductor Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla (who will also be part of the 2023 Gstaad Conducting Academy) to Beethoven’s “Pastorale” and Schumann’s “Ghost Variations”. Unique experiences await you!
Gstaad Festival Orchestra
The Gstaad Festival Orchestra, as the core of Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy, was founded and first presented itself to the public in 2010. Since 2017, the orchestra has been significantly shaped by Jaap van Zweden, Music Director of the New York Philharmonic. Together with internationally celebrated soloists, the members of the orchestra spend their annual vacations in Gstaad to work on symphonic repertoire. Abroad, the orchestra has performed in world renowned concert halls like the Konzerthaus Wien, the Philharmonie am Gasteig or the Elbphilharmonie. Since 2014, the Gstaad Festival Orchestra has served as Orchestra in Residence of the Gstaad Conducting Academy.
Gstaad Academy
It is with the idea of perpetuating its commitment to the next generation that Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy created the Gstaad Academy in 2008: a structure in its own right to support an increasingly rich academic offer. At the Gstaad Academy we offer the complete range of master courses addressed to young professionals, as well as all the courses which are aimed at amateur orchestra musicians of all ages.
About the Gstaad Menuhin Festival
The Yehudi Menuhin festival is an annual festival held in Gstaad, Switzerland. The first festival was held in 1957, it was organized by the world-famous conductor and violinist, virtuoso Yehudi Menuhin. The festival attracts an increasing number of participants and spectators every year, performances are held every day for more than a month and a half: the dates of the festival – are from mid-July to early September. The main program of the festival is classical music performed by the most famous artists, chamber and Symphony orchestras.
In 1957 Yehudi Menuhin and his family moved to Gstaad where he was fascinated and inspired by the elemental power of the region’s natural environment and commanding mountains. He was impressed not only by the Saanenland’s magnificent alpine arena, but also by the meeting of Western Switzerland, German-speaking culture, and the nearby South with its Italian lifestyle. Since Gstaad and its surrounding area also offered an ideal environment for an international education for his children (among others, the «Le Rosey» Institute and the International Kennedy School are based in the Saanenland), Menuhin settled with his family in the area. Walking in the mountains with his children, the city-dweller discovered the natural world of the native population, who were also to inspire Menuhin with their folklore and music.
In the spirit of its founding father Lord Menuhin, Christoph Müller set new accents in his first year in 2002 and continued successfully to promote and develop the festival with an open and creative programme philosophy that made trendsetting projects and long-term development in specific artistic spheres possible.
The Gstaad Chamber Music Festival focuses on outstanding artists (Joshua Bell, Sabine Meyer, Alfred Brendel, Andras Schiff, Hélène Grimaud), who invite their musical friends and partners to Gstaad “to make music in a relaxed atmosphere”. (citation from Yehudi Menuhin)
The Symphony Orchestra Concerts in the Gstaad Festival Tent have brought symphonic brilliance back to Gstaad, including through close partnerships with orchestras such as the London Symphony Orchestra. The series “Today’s Music” promotes encounters between various music styles and cultures in the spirit of Yehudi Menuhin’s pivotal musical experiences, often surprising and unexpected. This cycle has earned widespread recognition with artists such as Bobby McFerrin, Nigel Kennedy or Swiss jazz legend George Gruntz since the 2002 edition. Moreover, a Musical Project for Children has become a tradition with the performance every year of a work that is taught and prepared in the schools in Saanenland and performed by some 30 to 50 children from the region. Works such as “Pollicino” by Hans-Werner Henze, “Brundibar” by Hans Krasa or “Carnival of the Animals” by Camille Saint-Saëns remain memorable.
A platform for enthusiastic amateurs was also established, the “Gstaad Festival Amateur Orchestra” series: in 2008 the festival presented for the first time an Orchestra Week for Amateur Musicians, during which participants could rehearse and perform in concert with leading musicians from an established symphony orchestra for seven days. In 2009 this amateur orchestra was supplemented with a corresponding Youth Orchestra Week with 60 to 70 musicians. The some 130 amateur and youth musicians profit in this project from the combination of active music making and concert attendance – in short, they participate in the festival life.
