By Peter Bilotta | Executive Director
It’s hard to believe that this year’s Summer Festival has come to a close. It included five weeks of heavenly music, gorgeous summer-evening picnics, delicious desserts, hugs, laughter, and friends – pretty much Chamber Music Northwest in a nutshell!
Total attendance for our 30 Summer Festival concerts was 14,150 people – our highest since 2006. Attendance was 93% of our capacity, and included 12 sold-out concerts and an additional 3 with fewer than 20 tickets unsold. These sell-outs included all three of our Club Concerts featuring our young Protégé Artists.
Our Protégé Artists kept busy this year with dozens of mainstage and three Club Concert performances, outreach concerts at three local retirement homes, one community concert at the Portland Art Museum, and five open rehearsals for the public (including one specifically for families). They also had several sessions with younger music students, where they got to coach, encourage, and share their talents with the upcoming generation of musicians and music-lovers.
This summer, audiences were treated to both innovative new pieces and old favorites. I cannot tell you the number of times our patrons told me “This was the best concert I’ve ever attended at CMNW!” – and I heard it after nearly every concert of the season. Masterpieces such as Mozart’s “Gran Partita” immediately brought the crowd to its feet. There’s a reason they are called masterpieces, after all, and they never fail to move, inspire and thrill audiences, young and old.
In addition to these masterpieces, I think it is well worth pointing out the incredibly diverse repertoire our audiences enjoyed this season:
Creating great chamber music really is a collaboration – and not just between the artists who performed for us.All we do — the music, the exceptional artists who join us in Portland, the incredible variety of music, the fun, our free community events and many educational activities — becomes possible whenyoujoin the ensemble with your gift to Chamber Music Northwest. Thank you so much for your support and for making all these amazing programs come to life!
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