Bravo! Vail opens Thursday with Chamber Orchestra of Europe debut

It was meant to happen years ago. Anne-Marie McDermott had been following the Chamber Orchestra of Europe since the mid-1990s and, after becoming Bravo! Vail Music Festival’s artistic director in 2011, promoted the idea of bringing the group to Vail. A residency was finally set in place for June 2020, only to be canceled by the pandemic. At last, the 60-piece Chamber Orchestra of Europe is making its long-awaited Bravo! Vail debut for a three-concert residency on June 19, 21, and 22, opening the 38th season of the festival this weekend.

Founded in 1981, the internationally renowned ensemble is composed of principals or section leaders from national orchestras, members of eminent chamber groups, and music educators.

The orchestra started with a group of musicians who were members of the European Community Youth Orchestra in the late 1970s. In its early days, they worked with the star conductors Claudio Abbado and, later, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, with whom the ensemble developed further and recorded a full set of the Beethoven symphonies. The orchestra is still known today for its partnerships with important conductors and soloists. More recently, it has worked with the leading conductors Yannick Nézet-Séguin — their recording of the Brahms symphonies was released last year — Simon Rattle, and Matthias Pintscher, and with the pianist-conductor András Schiff. “It’s one of these ensembles about which word spreads quickly because of its extraordinary level of music-making,” McDermott said.

Instead of offering full seasons, the group focuses on project-based residencies and special projects for specific times of the year, when the musicians are free from engagements with their primary ensembles. “And that’s exactly what they’re doing at their Bravo! Vail residency,” McDermott said. “Something magical happens with the chemistry among musicians of this caliber — their concerts become greater than the sum of the parts.”

One of the highlights of their Bravo! Vail residency is the appearance of the Israeli-American pianist Yefim Bronfman, an internationally renowned virtuoso whose exceptional performances of Brahms, in particular, can be considered authoritative. McDermott, a remarkable pianist herself, looks up to Bronfman as “a profound musician and one of the world’s finest pianists.” Bronfman will be the soloist for the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1, on Friday, and No. 2 on Sunday. He last performed at the festival in 2021.

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The Brahms performances will be of special interest not only because of Bronfman’s artistry, but also because the size of the orchestra harkens back to 19th-century performance practices. “When these piano concertos were premiered during Brahms’s lifetime, it was with an ensemble of about 50 musicians, making them more personal than with a 100-piece orchestra,” McDermott said.

The second concert, on Saturday, welcomes back Alisa Weilerstein, who last performed at Bravo! Vail in 2018, for Brahms’s Double Concerto for Violin and Cello, with the young Canadian violinist Blake Pouliot, making his festival debut. Audiences will be enjoying a healthy dose of Brahms over the three days.

Music by Haydn, Schubert, and Stravinsky completes the programs, which will be conducted by Matthias Pintscher — he and the orchestra are arriving early this week for rehearsals — who performed with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe for the first time in 2018. The German conductor and composer is the new music director of the Kansas City Symphony; he recently completed a 10-year appointment as the music director of the Ensemble Intercontemporain, the Paris-based new-music magnet.

The members of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe select their musical partners, explains McDermott, and Pintscher “has formed a beautiful relationship with them,” she said. “This is one of the greatest projects to have happened at Bravo! Vail. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience to have these artists in this repertoire and long overdue.”

The performances take place at the Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater in Vail, Colorado. Visit BravoVail.org for more information.