Davidsbündler Music Academy celebrates first year with festival
Florence Lockheart
Friday, May 26, 2023
Running from 15 - 18 June, the inaugural Davidsbündler Feest celebrates a successful first season for the Davidsbündler Music Academy
The Davidsbündler Music Academy will next month launch its first Davidsbündler Feest to celebrate the culmination if its inaugural season. Students, guests and faculty including Academy founders Anna Fedorova and Nicholas Schwartz will perform various concerts at the academy’s home in The Hague (pictured below), as well as in nearby Amerongen and Amsterdam.
Following an opening concert on 15 June at the Academy, the festival will present concerts and masterclasses across the whole weekend, culminating in a concert at Castle Amerongen on 18 June. Concerts will also feature academy student who, in the academy’s first year, have won a total of 22 prizes worldwide.
London Symphony orchestra principal bass and Academy visiting professor Rodrigo Moro Martín described the Academy’s teaching as, ‘really dynamic, very welcoming.’ He added: ‘As a project I think it’s just fantastic, to have this intensive course is very important for students… I think it’s important for the students to get this kind of information in preparation for their musical life, auditions, etc.’
Founded in 2022, the Academy works in partnership with the Davidsbündler Foundation to offer classical music tuition to pianists and string players. Following the mission of Ukrainian pianist Anna Fedorova and American double bass player and cellist Nicholas Santangelo Schwartz, the foundation funds scholarships for academy students from low-income families and, since March 2022 has developed the additional focus of providing Ukrainian music students with lessons and Ukrainian music teachers with an income.
The Foundation also organizes concerts and masterclasses to enhance students’ learning, with musicians including Daniel Rowland, Maja Bogdanović and Olivier Thierry sharing their expertise. Upcoming Q&A Sessions are set to draw on the experiences of specialists including Channel Classics Label artistic director and recording engineer Jared Sacks and Eric Schoones, editor-in-chief of the German PIANIST magazine.
Lessons, masterclasses and concert experience will continue in the Academy’s upcoming 2023-34 season, with new partnerships formed with organisations including Dalfsen Klassiek, Nederlands StrijkKwartet Academie and Stift Festival.
