I Cantori di Carmel gets payment, finally
This column recently focused on the fraudulent payment practices of Brown Paper Tickets, a Seattle-based vendor that has withheld funds from artists, organizations and event producers worldwide. The company, which was sued in 2020 by the Washington state attorney general for close to $7 million of outstanding debt, refused to meet its financial obligation to I Cantori di Carmel last year as the ticketer for the ensemble's winter concert performances.
The organization was supposed to receive nearly
$25,000 in ticket proceeds within 10 business days of its concerts. Months went by and nothing happened despite many appeals to Events.com, the vendor's new owner.
Music director Daniel Henriks says, “What they owed us was about a third of what every concert costs to produce. It's big. It would have really caused some major problems… We attached a link to the Herald article everywhere. Apparently, they don't like media pressure. But we have no excuse or explanation of why it took so long.”
Events.com finally paid I Cantori in two payments, without comment. Henriks adds, “But they took all the track records off the website so we couldn't prove the exact payment history.
“We are a relatively big organization among the small nonprofits,” he says. “We have a little bit of a cash reserve.” But many of those groups don't. “If the contract says they will receive their money within 10 days and then they keep it for three, four, six months or more, it is killing those groups.”
Brown Paper Tickets still functions as a ticketing service and, sadly, its new owners appear uncommunicative and financially unreliable. Best stay away from them.
Springtime Waltz
I Cantori presents “Springtime Waltz,” a fundraiser, April 1 at the Carmel Women's Club, described as a light
hearted afternoon of operetta, Viennese Schrammel folk music and Austrian delicacies in a traditional wine tavern atmosphere. Soloists from the chorus's upcoming spring program join in the merrymaking along with Henriks, conductor Dave Dally, singer Mike Marotta and more. The event takes place from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. For tickets and information, see www.icantori.org. I Cantori will be featuring a performance of Mozart's magnificent Requiem at the end of April.
Carmel Music Society presents Benjamin Grosvenor
British piano virtuoso Benjamin Grosvenor makes his long-awaited Carmel debut at Sunset Center this Sunday at 3 p.m. in a scintillating program of works ranging from Bach to Prokofiev. Internationally renowned for his electrifying performances and his command of arduous technical complexities, Grosvenor has been hailed in the British press as “one in a million…several million” and “a keyboard visionary” in a European newspaper. The New York Times says this pianist makes you sigh with joy.
At the age of 11, Grosvenor won the Keyboard Final of the 2004 BBC Young Musician Competition. He was invited to perform with the BBC Symphony Orchestra at the First Night of the 2011 BBC Proms when he was 19. He was announced as the inaugural recipient of The Ronnie and Lawrence Ackman Classical Piano Prize with the New York Philharmonic in 2016. He has appeared with major orchestras internationally and works regularly with the world's leading conductors. In 2011, he signed up with Decca Classics, becoming the youngest British musician ever, and the first British pianist in almost 60 years, to join the label.
His Carmel program includes the J.S. Bach / F. Busoni Chaconne in D Minor, a Schumann Fantasy in C Major, Ravel's Le Tombeau de Couperin, and Sonata No. 7 in B-flat Major by Prokofiev. The concert takes place at 3 p.m. at Sunset Center. For tickets and more information, call 831-625-9938 or see the web at www.carmelmusic.org.
Ensemble Monterey presents favorites for strings
Music director John Anderson will conduct Ensemble Monterey's third concert of its season that celebrates three decades of superb classical programs. As the name suggests, the program showcases the ensemble's string section.
Anderson says, ”During this 30th anniversary season, I have programmed at least one all-time favorite on each of our concerts. This concert will present three very different compositions, but the `favorite' in the title will be the all-time triumph, the Octet for Strings by Felix Mendelssohn … Ensemble Monterey last performed the Octet 19 years ago, and it's time for this musical treasure again.”
The program begins with Ernst Bloch's Concerto Grosso Number 1. Bloch was a Swiss-American composer who was active in the first half of the last century. “He is best known as a composer of Jewish-inspired contemporary music,” says Anderson, “but the secular Concerto Grosso was his way of proving to his students that vital 20th Century music could still be written in a Baroque format.”
Sir John Tavener's Eternal Memory features cello soloist Kristin Garbeff. Anderson describes this as a deeply significant
and meditative work. This will be the California premiere of Eternal Memory and only the third performance in the Western Hemisphere. The title refers to humanity's distant but abiding recollection of the paradise of creation.
The concert takes place Saturday at 7 p.m. at Monterey's First Presbyterian Church with another performance Sunday at Santa Cruz at Peace United Church. If you would like to attend this concert via live stream, a $20 donation will give you access to the Sunday concert along with Anderson's Conductor's Notes talk at 6 p.m. A link will be sent to all who purchase a live stream ticket with instructions for how to tune in. For tickets and more information call 831-333-1283 or visit the web at www.ensemblemonterey.org.
Carmel Bach Festival tickets
The Carmel Bach Festival presents its 86th season, “Beginnings,” July 1529. General ticket sales open April 1 offering patrons more than 50 events to enjoy. The Festival schedule includes main concerts, chamber concerts, pre-concert talks, open masterclasses in Baroque vocal and instrumental technique, the family concert, and more.
New artistic director and principal conductor Grete Pedersen says, “I am delighted and humbled to become a part of Carmel Bach Festival's rich and fascinating tradition. Together with our highly skilled musicians, staff, and volunteers, I very much look forward to meeting you this summer in a soundscape of old and new beginnings. She says the Festival's theme reflects how composers and performers are innovative, creative, and affirming. “They can show us paths, familiar and unknown, outwards to the world and inwards to ourselves.”
Pedersen, who hails from Norway, has studied the history of the Festival and appreciates the legacy of its special Carmel spirit. She says, “If you think of an engine starting, or striking a match, there's a spark. When the Festival began in 1935, they were able to ignite a fire, and it's still here. I really want to have contact with the spirit, energy and intensity that was there at the beginning of the Festival. They did it just for the love of music. I want us to be reminded of that enthusiasm and love—to be grateful for the music that's here.”
For information about the new season, visit the Festival's website at www. bachfestival.org.
Monterey County Pops
Thursday, 22 professional musicians from Monterey County Pops! will travel to Soledad to conduct workshops with the Soledad High School band and Mariachi students. Following the twohour workshops, the students will perform with the Pops! in a free concert at 6:30 p.m. at the high school. Faculty member Edward Maag will conduct the combined bands and Pops musicians for this special free concert.