A musical colony for harpists fulfills the dream of its artistic director, Rita Costanzi, and continues a program of summer music festivals for Powell River Academy of Music.
The International Harp Academy of the Pacific is launching this summer, with renowned harpist Costanzi at the centre.
The academy has had a long working relationship with Costanzi, said Don James, the academy’s music director, which dates from the 1980s. “She’s always had this idea of having a harp colony,” he said. “She’s really enamoured with Powell River and the beauty of it and the quietness of it. It fits into her philosophy.”
Costanzi has been involved in the Symphony Orchestra Academy of the Pacific (SOAP) from the beginning and when the academy decided not to carry on with it, messages were sent to all the faculty, James said, to see if anyone was interested in smaller festivals that were more manageable, in terms of the amount of work and how much funding it would take to put them on. “We did get three proposals and Rita’s was one of them,” he said. “It seemed the most ready to actually mount with the least amount of risks for the academy.”
While another group of music lovers is continuing a symphony orchestra event, under the auspices of the Pacific Region International Summer Music Academy (PRISMA), the academy decided to move forward with the harp academy.
Mike Heron, project manager, said Costanzi came forward in June last year with her dream of having an academy of advanced students and professionals who would come together for intensive study for two weeks, this year slated from June 16 to 28. Mornings are designed for private practice, while afternoons will be devoted to master classes. The schedule is interspersed with performances throughout the community, including in rural areas, as well as an opening and closing concert. “She’s hoping to recruit 10 harpists for the first year,” Heron said. “She’d like to see it expand to 20.”
The harps will be rented from a company in Vancouver, Heron added. “It’s going to be exciting,” he said. “This will be the first time on the West Coast for a colony of this kind.”
Costanzi’s approach is to help students and professionals retreat from their orchestra jobs or teaching schedules to practice, rest and rejuvenate while learning, developing and growing as musicians. The repertoire will be enhanced by the integration of art history, literature, history and philosophy, pedagogy, chamber works and orchestral excerpts.
The daughter of musicians who has played harp since she was nine years old, Costanzi is a concert performer, recording artist, actor, teacher, composer, writer, fundraiser and public speaker. She is the former principal harpist with Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and CBC Radio Orchestra. She moved to New York City in 2007.
James said Costanzi has been doing quite of bit of work in South America with Alex Kline, a former principal oboist with Chicago Philharmonic Orchestra, whom she met at SOAP. James said one of the ideas is to link the work Costanzi is doing there with the Powell River colony.
Another plan for the harp colony is to develop a major work. The academy will be applying for a grant to commission a piece with three movements for a mixed children’s choir and 10 harps, James said. The work is expected to be in progress for two years, he added, and would become a major work in the second year of the harp academy, if it continues. “We hope one movement will be done this summer in that closing concert,” he said. The completed piece would then be performed in a concert at International Choral Kathaumixw.
More information about the harp academy is available on the academy’s website.
