Music Academy of the West

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The Music Academy of the West ( German  Music Academy of the West ) is a summer academy in Montecito in Santa Barbara County , California for talented young musicians. Qualified applicants receive a full scholarship.

description

The academy organizes an eight-week music festival in which seminars and concerts take place under the direction of famous composers, conductors and musicians. The festival annually awards performance grants to around 140 young musicians who are at the beginning of their professional careers. The age limit is 27 years for strings and 34 years for all other musicians. The study programs offered are divided into: solo piano , singing , singing with piano accompaniment, piano with instrumental accompaniment and in: strings , wood and brass , harp and percussion .

history

The music academy was founded in 1947 by patrons and musicians from southern California , including the German soprano Lotte Lehmann , conductor Otto Klemperer and the Austrian composer Arnold Schönberg , who had emigrated to America in the 1930s while fleeing the Nazi regime. The singers and actors Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy , the violinist Jascha Heifetz and the film producer Darryl F. Zanuck were among the first sponsors of scholarships .

From 1954 to 1980 Maurice Abravanel was the music director of the academy. Lotte Lehmann was the first head of the vocal division, followed by Martial Singher from 1962 to 1981. From 1997 to 2018 the vocal program was headed by Marilyn Horne .

Since 2010, the academy has hosted the Marilyn Horne Song Competition each year , previously known as the Marilyn Horne Foundation Vocal Competition .

In 2014, the Academy began a four-year educational partnership with the New York Philharmonic . As part of the collaboration, Music Director Alan Gilbert and members of the orchestra have taught selected students in Santa Barbara and New York City . A partnership with the London Symphony Orchestra began in 2018 .

Since 2017 the academy has only used Steinway pianos .

Faculty and visiting professor

Well-known guest teachers and faculty members included: Thomas Adès , Jeanne Baxtresser , Ernest Bloch , Carol Burnett , Roy Harris , Daniel Hope , Marilyn Horne , Jerome Lowenthal , Darius Milhaud , Roman Totenberg , Rosalyn Tureck and Deborah Voigt .

Former students

Among the academy's students were: Burt Bacharach , Grace Bumbry , Juan Diego Flórez , Thomas Hampson , Megan Marie Hart , Marilyn Horne , David Shifrin, and Nadine Sierra .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Admissions | Music Academy. In: Music Academy of the West. June 24, 2019. Retrieved June 24, 2019 (American English).
  2. ^ Places: Music Academy of the West, Hahn Hall. In: Santa Barbara Independent. Archived from the original on December 14, 2017 ; Retrieved June 24, 2019 (American English).
  3. ↑ a b c History | Music Academy. In: Music Academy of the West. Archived from the original on December 28, 2018 ; Retrieved June 24, 2019 (American English).
  4. ^ Don Michael Randel: The Harvard biographical dictionary of music . Belknap Press of Harvard Univ. Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts 1996, ISBN 0-674-37299-9 (American English, google.de [accessed June 24, 2019]).
  5. ↑ Burt A. Folkart: martial singher; Baritone, Famed Voice Teacher. In: Los Angeles Times. March 12, 1990, archived from the original on June 24, 2019 ; accessed on June 24, 2019 (American English): "... head of the vocal department at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara - a position he assumed when the legendary Lotte Lehmann retired ..."
  6. ^ Joanie Brittingham: From Student To Teacher: Marilyn Horne. In: Classical Singer. January 1, 2014, archived from the original on June 24, 2019 ; Retrieved June 24, 2019 (American English).
  7. ↑ Allan Kozinn: New York Philharmonic to Team With Music Academy of the West. In: The New York Times. March 31, 2014, archived from the original on December 29, 2018 ; Retrieved June 24, 2019 (American English).

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