I felt a twinge of nostalgia the other day as I opened my email and saw an update from the Marlboro Music Festival announcing the day of everyone’s arrival.
Summer, for musicians, usually means music festivals of one kind or another. My husband is teaching this week at Aspen Music Festival, so we are here, enjoying the mountains and fresh air, letting Andreas explore the pedestrian streets of the town. He now knows what a fountain is, and, after spending some time listening to a street musician, loves the banjo. Go figure!
Since I spent a summer in Aspen as a music student, our time here has got me thinking about the role that music festivals have played in my life. I have many fond memories of Aspen. I remember getting lost on Aspen Mountain on the 4th of July (never go off the trail – even if it seems like a shortcut!), playing the most difficult opera I had ever played up to that point (Thomas Ades’ Powder Her Face), and – at 9000 feet and far from big city lights – seeing the stars and the Milky Way like never before.
At Aspen Music Festival and every other festival I went to, I met inspiring people, made wonderful friends, and had musical experiences I wouldn’t have had otherwise. However, while at a winter festival in Israel one December, I became friends with someone who told me about the Marlboro Music Festival, a small chamber music festival in Vermont. He spoke in glowing terms about it and gave me the address and phone number (these were the old days) of the person to contact. I loved listening to his stories about the place, and started doing a little research on my own. The more I learned about Marlboro, the more I knew that if I had one wish in my musical life at that point, it would be to experience this place. I read memoirs of people connected to Marlboro, of chamber music groups that had been born there, I listened to all the recordings I could find that had any connection to the festival or those who had spent time there. I was stunned by the number of musicians that I admired who had been there. I had never heard of it before my friend told me about it – how was that possible? Three years later, I spent the first of four amazing summers there.
I feel like everyone needs a place (physical or otherwise) that feeds the spirit and nurtures our ideals – a place where dreams can be born and where there is time to explore what we so often don’t have time for in “real life.” Marlboro was it for me for those four summers. The word “depth” characterizes the experience of the place. There was time to rehearse and practice without necessarily the goal of performing. There was time for long walks with friends, time for visits by poets and authors, time to get to know people at meals. I wouldn’t say it was always an easy time. Though there was a constant stream of outrageous and funny things, it was hard work, though the best kind of hard work – the kind that leaves you feeling invigorated and changed. Also, it was a time when I was figuring out some major things in life as a young adult. So it wasn’t ALL fun and games, but it was good and deeply affecting. I realized the other day when I opened that email that, though I haven’t been there for a long time, Marlboro continues to be one of those “places” for me. It reminds me of some of my most dearly-held values, musical or otherwise. It is an antidote to the “grind” and the accompanying cynicism that can creep in. It reminds me what is possible when there is space to breathe.
My wish for myself and all my readers this summer: may we all find some open air, internal and external space to roam, starry nights, and good memories that will sustain and inspire us for years to come!
