More than 120 classical musicians of African descent from throughout the United States will perform in Rochester, NY from August 8 through August 13 at the 2017 Gateways Music Festival, presented in association with the Eastman School of Music. The instrumentalists will be featured in solo, chamber music, and orchestral concerts at several venues. Among the musicians are members of American orchestras and college and university music-school faculties as well as concert and freelance artists. All festival events are free and open to the public. Works by composers of African descent including Joseph Bologne, Le Chevalier de St. Georges of 18th-century Paris; Rochester native Adolphus Hailstork; and contemporary composer Jessie Montgomery will be performed. Non-concert events include a panel discussion by the musicians, a community education forum, and a pre-concert talk by Paul Burgett, an authority on African-American music. The festival finale on August 13 will be the Gateways Music Festival Orchestra Concert, under the direction of Music Director Michael Morgan. Pianist Stewart Goodyear will be the soloist in Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto on a program that also includes Brahms’s Second Symphony and Hailstork’s An American Port of Call. Visit http://gatewaysmusicfestival.org/ for more information.
Posted August 1, 2017
