“For the second year in a row, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra New Music Festival will offer audiences an opportunity to dig into a rich assortment of works by living composers” from June 20 to 23, writes Tim Smith in Tuesday’s (6/19) Baltimore Sun. “The brain child of BSO music director Marin Alsop, the festival [will feature] Osvaldo Golijov’s ‘Mariel,’ a reflection on a friend’s death [and] Dan Visconti’s ‘Low Country Haze,’ an evocation of the sensory excitement of Hernando de Soto’s 1540 expedition to parts of what is now the American South. Also on the festival lineup is the world premiere of [Kevin Puts’s] Oboe Concerto … written for BSO principal oboist Katherine Needleman…. This year’s schedule features a full orchestra concert at Meyerhoff Symphony Hall (pay what you wish) and a relatively small-scale program at Peabody ($15). Once again there will also be a free ‘chamber jam’ [with] Shodekeh, OK Miss (a band formed by composer Du Yun) … and the Baltimore new music ensemble Mind on Fire…. There’s a free, interactive children’s concert … featuring new percussion music…. The 2017 festival drew sizable, enthusiastic audiences, with about 1,700 turning up for the closing BSO concert, an impressive number for a new music program.”
