The Honest Brook Music Festival 2023 Season
The Honest Brook Music Festival is back in the Catskill Mountains for another summer session!
Photo courtesy of Honest Brook Music Festival
Hosted in a converted dairy barn, this annual festival has become a fixture of the classical music scene in Delaware County and the surrounding area for the past 34 years. The festival offers a unique opportunity for audience members to meet world-class musicians in a laid back environment with an absolutely stunning backdrop. During intermission, audience members are encouraged to enjoy refreshments in the perennial garden. This one-of-a-kind festival season runs for four weekends beginning Saturday, July 15th and ending Sunday, August 13th.
Photo courtesy of Honest Brook Music Festival
Spearheading the season will be pianist Chaeyoung Park on Saturday, July 15th at 7:30pm.
Chaeyoung Park has been praised as a passionate pianist who “does not play a single note without thought or feeling.” (New York Concert Review). Embracing a broad range of the classical music literature, her programs feature works ranging from the early French Baroque by Rameau, to Beethoven sonatas, to new music by living composers including South Korean classical composer, Unsuk Chin.
While pursuing the Bachelor of Music degree at the Juilliard School, Ms. Park was awarded the Juilliard Gina Bachauer Scholarship, which offers a year of full-tuition scholarship. South Korean-born, and raised in Lawrence, Kansas, Ms. Park returns to Kansas frequently to share music with her community whenever she needs a break from her current home in New York City.
Photo courtesy of Honest Brook Music Festival
Second in the festival line up, on Saturday, July 22nd at 7:30pm is John Moore, baritone, and Adam Golka on piano.
A frequent performer in both Europe and the United States, baritone John Moore is garnering praise for his energetic performances and burnished baritone in both operatic and concert repertoire. He is a graduate of the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Program. During the 2020/20201 season, John Moore’s engagements included Handel’s Messiah with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the title role in The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs with Atlanta Opera, Austin Opera, and many more.
Pianist Adam Golka has been regularly on the concert stage since the age of sixteen, when he won first prize at the 2nd China Shanghai International Piano Competition. He has also received the Gilmore Young Artist Award and the Max I. Allen Classical Fellowship Award from the American Pianists Association. Mr. Golka begins 2023 with recitals for Philip Lorenz International Keyboard Concerts and Mesa Arts Center, performing a program that bridges two long-term repertoire interests: Beethoven Sonatas, and Brahms, whose complete piano works he will perform and record over the next few years.
Photo courtesy of Honest Brook Music Festival
On Sunday, August 3rd at 3pm, The Balourdet Quartet takes the stage.
The Balourdet Quartet (Angela Bae, violin; Justin DeFilippis, violin; Benjamin Zannoni, viola; and Russell Houston, cello) based in Boston, Massachusetts, is currently in residence at the New England Conservatory’s Professional String Quartet Program. The quartet received the Grand Prize at the 2021 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition, as well as prizes in international competitions including the Banff, Paolo Borciani, and Carl Nielsen competitions. They were also awarded the Gold Medal at the 2020 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and the 2021 Chamber Music Yellow Springs Competition.
The Balourdet Quartet was formed in 2018 at Rice University in Houston, Texas under the tutelage of James Dunham, Norman Fischer, and Cho-Liang Lin. The quartet takes its name from Antoine Balourdet, chef extraordinaire at the Hotel St. Bernard and beloved member of the Taos School of Music community.
Photo by Mark Roemisch
Rounding out the festival, on August 13th at 3pm, is the highly acclaimed Neave Trio.
Since forming in 2010, Neave Trio – violinist Anna Williams, cellist Mikhail Veselov, and pianist Eri Nakamura – has earned enormous praise for its engaging, cutting -edge performances. WQXR explains, “‘Neave’ is actually a Gaelic name meaning ‘bright’ and ‘radiant’, both of which certainly apply to this trio’s music making.” The group’s 2019 album Her Voice, on Chandos Records, was named one of the best recordings of the year by both The New York Times and BBC Radio 3.
Neave has performed at many esteemed concert series and at festivals worldwide, including Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival, Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, Smithsonian American Art Museum, 92nd Street Y, Rockport Chamber Music Festival, Norfolk and Norwich Chamber Music Series (United Kingdom), and the Samoylov and Rimsky Korsakow Museums’ Chamber Music Series in St. Petersburg (Russia).
We cannot wait to see you at The Honest Brook Music Festival.
Directions to The Honest Brook Music Festival:
The Barn is located at
1885 Honest Brook Road
Delhi, NY 13753
It is 1.9 miles up Honest Brook Road if you are coming from Route 28 between Delhi and Meridal, NY
For further information of travel assistance email hbmf@aol.com or call (607) 746-3770.