The Institute and Festival for Contemporary Performance. June 13, 2004

The Institute and Festival for Contemporary Performance at Mannes College will create opportunities not available before in New York City.

It will bring together a small group of students (14 students), among the most talented young performers in the US and abroad, to work with established and experienced Musicians.
It will give them a performance opportunity (one student concert at the end of the week) and even bring a very select few the chance to perform alongside those well-known musicians in the concerts of the Festival itself.

This Institute and Festival aims not only at presenting concerts at the highest level of accomplishment, within a forum of ideas and an educational support, but also at integrating the younger generation of performers within the larger New York Cultural milieu and its multifaceted possibilities, addressing a clearly emerging need and demand both from young musicians and from the public.

Concurrently and as part of its core purpose, IFCP aims at creating a body of works through a commissioning program, helping to energize the creative community. In its first year, the Festival is commissioning a young and upcoming composer, Albert Carbonell. In subsequent years, an established composer, as well as a younger one, will be commissioned.

Although small in size, IFCP is in scope a major project for the musical culture of New York City.
In its inaugural year in 2004, the artists/performers will include pianists Ursula Oppens and Bruce Brubaker, violinists Rolf Schulte and Curtis Macomber, the Dean of Mannes College scholar/violinist Joel Lester, the director of IFCP pianist/conductor Marc Ponthus.

Special guests will include composer Fred Lerdahl, members of "Speculum Musicae", the ensemble "agua, si", and the commissioned composer, Albert Carbonell.

The last concert will be devoted to the music of Charles Wuorinen and will include a conversation with the composer.

For more information: http://www.mannes.edu/ifcp/