Cooperstown Fest Features Kurt Elling, Nat'l Jazz Museum in Harlem All Stars

Jazz performer Kurt Elling and the American and Juilliard string quartets are featured in the 13th season of the newly renamed Cooperstown Summer Music Festival.

Cooperstown is a popular summer destination as the home of the Glimmerglass Festival, the National Baseball Hall of Fame, The Farmers' Museum, and Fenimore Art Museum. The Festival, which until this year was called the Cooperstown Chamber Music Festival, also features the National Jazz Museum in Harlem All Stars, Music from Copland House, the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, and a "Boston Comes to Cooperstown" concert featuring Alexander Velinzon and Keisuke Wakao of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and Marcus Thompson of the Boston Chamber Music Society. The Festival will continue its tradition of offering free concerts for the community, with the Flute Fest on August 4.

Since 1999, the Festival has offered nearly 100 concerts, including classical, jazz, bluegrass, cabaret and kids' concerts in and around Cooperstown.

"Our new name better reflects the range of music we offer, and the easy informality of the Festival," explains the Festival's artistic director and founder, Linda Chesis. Ms. Chesis, a flutist, is chair of the Woodwind Department and a member of the flute faculty at the Manhattan School of Music.
"Festival concerts are vibrant, exciting and compelling-the antithesis of what some people think when they hear ‘chamber music,'" says board member Patsy Manley Smith. "So, becoming the Cooperstown Summer Music Festival is a much better fit for us. We'd like to add new Festival concert-goers to the core of people who come to enjoy the Festival year after year. It's going to be a great summer."
To encourage people to attend, the Festival board also lowered ticket prices for 2011.
The Festival kicks-off July 3 at 3 pm with the National Jazz Museum in Harlem All Stars, under the direction of Loren Schoenberg. They will perform classic jazz in the tradition of the Count Basie, Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman bands. Chesis said that people are encouraged to come early to visit The Farmers' Museum and the Fenimore Art Museum, which is located just across the street. Festival concert-goers can receive half-price admission at either museum July 3. "It's a great way to spend a summer day, museums in the morning, and a concert in the afternoon," says Chesis.

On July 14 at 7:30 pm at the Otesaga Resort Hotel, the award-winning Music from Copland House returns to the Festival to celebrate Bastille Day with works by Ravel, Copland, Piazzolla, and Martinu. Music from Copland House features Tim Fain, violin; Michael Boriskin, piano; Wilhelmina Smith, cello; and Linda Chesis, flute.

Kurt Elling and his quartet perform July 29 at 7: 30 pm at the Otesaga Hotel. Grammy-winner Elling will perform jazz standards as well as songs from his new album, The Gate. The Gate has garnered Elling much acclaim, including cover stories in Jazz Times, Jazz Inside and Jazzwise. He has been named "Male Singer of the Year" by the Jazz Journalists Association on half a dozen occasions in the past ten years, and is nominated again this year.

On August 10 at 7:30 pm at The Farmers' Museum, Boston Comes to Cooperstown in a concert featuring Alexander Velinzon and Keisuke Wakao of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Marcus Thompson of the Boston Chamber Music Society, and Festival favorites cellist Inbal Segev and Linda Chesis. They will perform works by Bach, Mozart, Britten and Ginestera.

The American String Quartet performs with Linda Chesis on August 15 at 7:30 pm at the Otesaga Hotel. The American, which is celebrating its 35th season, has been hailed for its "luxurious, beautifully sculptured performances." Quartet members are Peter Winograd and Laurie Carney, violin; Daniel Avshalomov, viola; and Wolfram Koessel, cello. They will perform works by Haydn, Ravel and Ries.
The East Coast Chamber Orchestra performs August 21 at 3 pm at the Otesaga Resort Hotel. The 14-member strong ECCO combines the power of a great orchestral ensemble with the sensitivity of a superb chamber music ensemble. ECCO will perform works by Mozart, Elgar, Bartok, and Corelli.
The Festival finale is August 28 at The Farmers' Museum with the Juilliard String Quartet performing works by Haydn, Martinu and Beethoven. Earlier this year the Recording Academy presented the JSQ with a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award. They are the first classical ensemble to be honored in this way.

The Festival continues its tradition of offering free concerts for the community with the Flute Fest on August 4 at 7:30 pm at the Otesaga Hotel. A flute choir from the New York Summer Music Festival International Flute Institute will perform classical favorites.

Festival Venues
Concerts are held in Cooperstown, NY at The Farmers' Museum on July 3, August 10, and August 28, and at the Otesaga Resort Hotel on July 14 and 20, and August 4, 15, and 21. Both venues seat less than 300 people.
"Attending a Festival concert is a truly wonderful, intimate experience. The artists are world-class, yet Festival venues hold a few hundred people. There is a friendly give-and-take between the artists and the audiences that you just can't experience in a grand concert hall," says Smith.
The Farmer's Museum, one of the oldest rural life museums in the country, is located at 5775 State Route 80, Cooperstown, NY. Festival concerts are held in the museum's Louis C. Jones Center, a renovatEd Stone barn known for its excellent acoustics.

The Otesaga Resort Hotel, a grand, century-old hotel overlooking Otsego Lake, is located at 60 Lake Street in Cooperstown.
Tickets and Information
Ticket prices have been reduced for 2011. There is an added discount when tickets are purchased prior to June 16. Tickets can be ordered online, www.CooperstownMusicFest.org, or by calling the box office service Brown Paper Tickets, 800/838-3006. Tickets will be sold at the door, as available.
Adult tickets purchased before June 16 are $22, after that date, $25. Student tickets are $15. The Flute Fest on August 4 is a free concert and does not require a ticket or a reservation.
To find out more about the season, go to www.CooperstownMusicFest.org, call the Festival at 877/666-7421, or email info@CooperstownMusicFest.org.

About Linda Chesis
Flutist Linda Chesis is founder and artistic director of the Cooperstown Summer Music Festival. She is a member of the flute faculty and chair of the Woodwind Department at the Manhattan School of Music. She has been hailed by critics on three continents as one of the most exciting and dynamic flutists of her generation. The top prize winner at the Paris and Barcelona International competitions, and at the National Flute Association Competition, Ms. Chesis has performed with orchestras and in solo recitals throughout the US, France, Great Britain, Germany, Japan and Korea. Her recordings can be heard on the EMI, Nonesuch and Music Masters labels.

About Festival posters, designed by Milton Glaser
2011 marks the tenth year that Milton Glaser designed a Festival poster featuring a violin-playing cow. An internationally celebrated graphic designer, Mr. Glaser created the I♥NY logo. His works are represented in the Permanent Collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Smithsonian, and the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum. In 2010, Mr. Glaser received the National Medal of Arts.