Dear Friend of the New Hampshire Music Festival:
What started in the 1950’s as an ensemble of music students, most from The Juilliard School in New York, spending summers on Melody Island in Lake Winnipesaukee performing live chamber concerts to patrons perched atop canoes and boats on the water is now, 70 years later, a fully-professional 75+ member New Hampshire Music Festival orchestra.
To the hundreds, if not thousands, of community members who served as donors, board members, administrators, and volunteers, the New Hampshire Music Festival thanks you for the vision you had so many years ago and the efforts you took to see that vision come true. To Plymouth State University, our summer home and performance venue for 40 years, thank you.
To the hundreds of professional musicians who have come from major orchestras across the country—some of whom have been members for decades—the New Hampshire Music Festival thanks you for the superb performances you have given over so many years. This year, we will celebrate our 70th anniversary, and our programs will include a look back at some of our achievements. We will open our classical season with a Festival commission from 1988, the Loon Lake Symphony by Alan Hovhaness. The chamber series will feature Trio for Flute, by our very own former principal oboe Sandra Flesher. Sam Higgins, son of our principal bass, Joseph Higgins, will perform a Bach cantata on the chamber series as well as an aria by Handel on the classical series. Please visit the Festival’s website (www.nhmf.org) for details about all our programs.
The New Hampshire Music Festival brass ensemble will be back on a pontoon boat on Squam Lake to perform our annual Water Music concert with works ranging from Gabrieli and Handel to Scott Joplin. With this concert for our water-loving friends, we have, in a sense, come full circle from our beginnings on Melody Island.
Now more than ever, we need your support to carry on the hard but rewarding work of the countless many before us. Our annual spring appeal goal is $50,000, and we are counting on you to ensure the 2022 season and 70 more seasons to come.
Sincerely,
Phil Boulter Lucinda Williams
Board Chairman Executive Director
The New Hampshire Music Festival is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. Fed. Tax ID 02-0245614
