Wednesday, February 6, 2013

New Blog Site

We hear at the Philadelphia International Music Festival would like to share with you our newest blog page! Please click here for the latest updates from all of us at PIMF. We will stop posting on this one soon.

The Glory Of Love

Click to continue reading 

Monday, June 11, 2012

Ken Hedgecock: Classical Music Discoveries


If you haven't had the pleasure of listening to Ken Hedgecock's podcast, Classical Music Discoveries, here's your chance! His shows are always full of interesting and useful information about all types of classical music. He recently featured PIMF on one of his podcasts. Here's his schedule for June 1-9, 2012:

1. Philadelphia International Music Festival
2. Play My Music - Episode 1
3. Pierre Dure - the People's Tenor
4. Zuill Bailey - Dvorak Cello Concerto CD Premiere
5. Matt Herskowitz Live at the Music Conservatory of Montreal
6. Matthew H. Fields - Music Among Friends
7. Alexandre Brussilovsky - Salute d'Amour
8. Mahler: Symphony No. 2 "Resurrection"
9. Ensemble Arts Academy
10.Alexandre Brussilovsky - One of the World's Most Heralded Violinists

Ken Hedgecock's Classical Music Discoveries

PIMF 2012 information and communication

As we draw closer to the start of 2012 PIMF, please check your email regularly, as we will be sending regular updates about your student or child's participation in the festival, including new and exciting concert events, off-campus outings including a Philadelphia Orchestra concert at the Mann Music Center with preconcert performances by PIMF 2012 Mann Center Competition winners, Master Classes with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra, solo performance and competition information, Grand Finale information, and more.

To listen to highlights of our festival from last year, please visit our Myspace. Here are two videos from last year for your viewing pleasure!


Artie Shaw's "Clarinet Concerto"
Performed by Matthew Griffith, clarinet and Davyd Booth, piano


The PIMF Gold orchestra performing Felix Mendelssohn's "Sinfonia No. 8"

Friday, June 8, 2012

PIMF and its musical endeavours

Since we've given you the scoop on the big wedding, we figured it's time to put the spotlight on the festival itself! Let's take a look at our talented students and faculty. Here's what were all about:

The students:

The PIMF is an organization that's been thriving and growing for 15 years. Its students come from all over the United States and other countries. Our festival includes multiple age divisions, and welcomes students anywhere between the ages of 8- 29. The best and most unique part of PIMF is that all of our students get to directly work with members of The Philadelphia Orchestra. We house our students at the beautiful Bryn Mawr campus, located in Pennsylvania. As well as having a strong orchestral performance study program, PIMF includes opportunities to study chamber music, solo performance, recitals given by both the faculty and students, master classes given by members of The Philadelphia Orchestra, and our very own concerto competition. We also offer scholarships to select students of the festival.

The Faculty:

We are lucky to have relationships with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra and top musicians in the area. Here are a few of our faculty members.

Woodwinds:
  • David Cramer, flute
  • Loren Lind, flute
  • Elizabeth Starr Masoudnia, oboe
  • David Blumberg, clarinet
  • Mark Gigliotti, bassoon
Strings:
  • Kimberly Fisher, violin
  • Marc Rovetti, violin
  • Noah Geller, violin
  • William dePasquale, violin
  • Choong- Jin Chang, viola
  • Kirsten Johnson, viola
  • Renard Edwards, viola
  • Hai- Ye Ni, cello
  • Gloria de Pasquale, cello
  • Udi Bar- David, cello
  • Joseph Conyers, bass
  • Maryanne Meyer, harp
  • And many more
For a complete list of our strings teachers, click here.

Brass:
  • Jeffrey Lang, horn
  • Shelly Showers, horn
  • Darin Kelly, trumpet
  • Matthew Vaughn, trombone
  • Scott Devereaux, tuba
Percussion and Piano:
  • Don Liuzzi, timpani
  • Hugh Sung, piano
  • Svetlana Smolina, piano
  • Song Nam, piano
Our conductors include the wonderful Cristian Macelaru of the Philadelphia Orchestra.

Interested yet? Come visit our website for more information on this awesome opportunity!

Friday, May 4, 2012

 


will be designing all of the personal flowers for Madi & Rob's wedding!

A stunning Bridal bouquet, beautiful Bridesmaid bouquets, elegant boutonnieres await!


Will we see hydrangea?  roses?  perhaps some orchids?
Whatever the floral selections, we are certain to be seeing dazzling designs that will compliment our stylish Bridal Party! 


Thank you Priscilla
we are so excited to be working with you!

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Confessions of a Renegade Conference Junkie


By: Melissa M. Slawsky, Ph.D., NCTM

Conferences can be one of the greatest untapped resources for the personal and professional development in the music world, especially for students. Conferences and workshops allow you to network and share ideas with other music colleagues on a grander scale—combining educational presentations, pedagogical sessions, presentations on business practices for independent music professionals, and master classes with the finest musicians and teachers in the world.

Unfortunately, I was ‘bit by the conference bug’ a little late in my graduate studies (when I could actually afford them). During the last two years of my doctoral studies, I had the pleasure of presenting research at the 2010 GP3 Group Piano and Piano Pedagogy Conference in Austin, Texas; 2011 Florida Music Educators Association Clinic-Conference in Tampa, FL; and 2011 National Conference Keyboard Pedagogy in Lombard, Illinois.

I cannot believe how much I learned in such a short period of time, how many amazing people I have met, and how much my passion for music and teaching has been fueled by attending these events. If you want to cram a degree’s worth of learning into a short amount of time and ‘rub elbows’ with some truly amazing people, I cannot recommend music education conferences and workshops enough.

Fast forward to 2012—I am 6 months into my post-Ph.D. slump… no longer eligible for the student discount (usually 25% or less than the non-student member rate). Although my conference budget had already been exhausted in the previous year, I could not stay away from the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) conference in New York City this past week. Headliners included a master class by Menahem Pressler (pianist and founder of the famous Beaux Arts Trio), a session on teaching practice techniques to students by legendary piano pedagogue, Martha Hilley, and exhibitor showcases from many of the publishers I use in my piano studio on a daily basis. Although I did not originally plan (and budget) to go, I simply could not stay away.

I decided to make an impromptu visit yesterday (3/27/12) with the intent of paying for one-day registration fee (at $155… OUCH!). Because I arrived so late, I decided instead to ask for a complimentary pass to the exhibition hall. This is where all of the vendors set up, give one-on-one presentations of their products, and give out tons of freebies (especially on the last day when many vendors don’t want to have to cart or ship everything back to their home town). I wasn’t sure if I would learn as much as I had at previous conferences, but I was pleasantly surprised by my experience, and it was well worth the trip!

My personal highlight reel-

  1. I had heard about Piano Marvel (www.pianomarvel.com), an interactive piano learning and assessment program that is essentially Guitar Hero for the piano, at a previous conference, but I had never got a chance to try it in person. I finally got to sit down with the inventor and founder and try it out for myself! Not only that, but I scored a great deal on a digital piano and bundle of books for my piano studio because it would have cost the owners so much to ship it back to their home state. 
  1. In the piano teaching world, there are many ‘rock stars’ that grace the pages of piano teaching materials. It is such a pleasure to be able to walk up to my favorite composers and authors, such as Randall Faber and Dennis Alexander, introduce myself, and pander for autographs and pictures. Where else can you ask someone to recommend music and materials for your studio, what inspired their works, and how their compositional process works?
  1. Although I went with a personal shopping list in hand for sheet music to buy for my students, conferences are a great place to discover new music. I discovered a wealth of beautiful piano music written by a group of phenomenal composers hailing from Canada at the Red Leaf Pianoworks booth (http://www.redleafpianoworks.com). Not only did I get to talk to some of these brilliant women, I got a one-on-one consultation and performance of the recommended materials. I cannot wait to introduce my students to this beautiful music.
  1. Although I am usually not partial to the renowned Steinway brand of pianos, I had the opportunity to see a gorgeous ornate piano in the process of being hand-carved by an amazing artisan. Seeing this unfinished work of art truly made me appreciate the painstaking craftsmanship that goes into these instruments. I regretted the fact that I did not allot enough time to take a Steinway Factory tour (www.steinway.com). 
  1. After the conference, it is so much fun to show my students all of the new stuff I learned and found, including the freebies! In celebration of Easter, I was able to give my piano students little packs of M&Ms and music dictation workbooks courtesy of the Carnegie Hall Royal Conservatory Achievement Program (http://www.theachievementprogram.org). I had tons of individual pieces of sheet music given by some of the various publishers— Alfred Music Publishers (www.alfred.com), Hal Leonard Corporation (www.halleonard.com), Faber Piano Adventures (www.pianoadventures.com), and the Neil A. Kjos Music Company (www.kjos.com).
So, listen up all of you music students, musicians, and music teachers— The next time you hear about a conference, workshop, training session, or summer music program in your area, do not hesitate to take advantage of any and all of these opportunities. You will not be disappointed.

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Music Mansion in Miami



Below, please find the full story that appeared in a recent publication of The Miami Herald highlighting our intense solo performance program "Music Mansion," held each winter in Miami, Florida. The almost full-page article was complete with several wonderful photos, including the one above of a participant practicing in the mansion's

Article:

MUSIC
South Florida mansion strikes the right chord with young classical musicians

BY ELINOR J. BRECHER

At an Italianate villa near Dadeland Mall, there’s a fiddler on the roof.
There’s also one in the master-bathroom shower and another in the dining room.
There are cellists in the laundry room, in closets, on the pool deck. Wherever there’s a vacant nook in, or atop, a nine-bedroom estate called Casa Florence, there’s a kid with a stringed instrument. Melodies blend and clash, as 21 string players work at their pieces.

It’s mid-afternoon Thursday, and the students attending the Philadelphia International Music Festival’s classical music “boot camp’’ are wrapping up five days of nonstop practice. They are as young as 10, as old as 18, from places like Tucson and Tempe, Ariz., Bellingham, Wash., Bethlehem, Penn., and Grosse Point, Mich. Two came from Broward County, one from Palm Beach Gardens. Some grew up in music, the children of concert professionals and teachers. Others simply showed talent early, and have non-musician parents who recognized it.

The camp, called Music in the Mansion, is run by Sandy and Richard Marcucci, a Philadelphia couple who used to run basketball camps but switched to classical music when their older daughter, now 24, took up the violin as a child. During the summer, they run 17-day intensive programs at Bryn Mawr College, featuring a faculty assembled from the famed Philadelphia Orchestra.

This is their fourth year in South Florida for the shorter winter version, which includes faculty from the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music, and former campers as practice coaches, including Madison Marcucci, the recent Juilliard graduate who spurred her parents’ career change.

The program caters to intermediate and advanced string players who might have heavy metal and hip-hop on their iPods but are serious students of music more commonly associated with their grandparents’ generation: Brahms, Bach and Bériot. That would be Charles Auguste de Bériot, the 19th Century French composer. Joyce Liu, a precocious, 10-year-old fifth-grader from Oak Hill, Va., planned to play Bériot’s “Violin Concerto No. 9 in A Minor, Opus 104” for an audience of about 40 at a recital Thursday evening, during which each student will solo.

“I started when I was 5,’’ said Joyce, who has graduated to a half-size violin, and isn’t sure whether she’ll turn professional. “I have no further knowledge of any career plans,’’ she said. Although she’s the youngest, Joyce said she felt “comfortable’’ among the camp of mostly teenagers.“I’ve improved so much,’’ she said.

The students, who pay $1,600 for all expenses except travel, practice five hours a day, with short breaks to cannonball into the heated pool, and for meals prepared by a professional chef. They’re stashed in every bedroom and on cots in giant walk-in closets, and have discovered great acoustics in the odd spaces, like a below-stairs powder room with a bidet.

Sandy Marcucci, 51, found Casa Florence on the Internet. The 11,000-square-foot, white marble-lined party venue is owned by builder Renzo Maietto, who initially thought he was dealing with a crazy person when Marcucci asked if she could install 21 young musicians, parental chaperones and a rented piano there for five nights and six days. But once she explained her mission, Maietto, who grew up in Milan “with Vivaldi in my house,’’ was eager. “We should cultivate this music’’ among teens, said Maietto, 65, of Coconut Grove.

Skye Kinlaw, a 16-year-old Baltimore-area high school junior, was the fiddler on the roof, where she said she felt “so much freedom — on top of the world.’’
 She was 3 when her father, a pharmacist, took her to a music store and placed a “teeny, tiny’’ violin in her hands. Now she studies at the Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University. Swapping her T-shirt for an emerald green evening gown, she performed Pablo de Sarasate’s “Malaguena” for the recital. Although most of the kids were strangers until days ago, Skye said the bonding was “instant.’’

“The camp opened a completely different world to me,’’ said Jason Karlyn, 22, now a practice coach. “There are some very gifted people here.’’
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/12/22/2558432/south-florida-mansion-strikes.html#storylink=cpy

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

More of Miami's "Music Mansion" . . . . .

As promised, below are photos of our one-of-a-kind solo performance program: "Music Mansion," held each year in wonderful Miami, Florida, featuring 22 dedicated young musicians who practice daily for four-five hours; work with outstanding teachers including: Udi Bar-David of The Philadelpia Orchestra, Glenn Basham of Miami's Frost School of Music ,and Hui Fang Chen of Lynn Univeristy in private lessons and master classes; work out daily with PIMF faculty accompanists; and perform in our final grand finale house concert at the end of the six-day "boot camp" for violin and cello.





More Music Mansion in Miami

More pictures from the Music Mansion