News
Extra performance of Master Pedro's Puppet Show added!
Jul 20, 2010
EXTRA PERFORMANCE OF MASTER PEDRO’S PUPPET SHOW ADDED TO THE CASTLETON FESTIVAL’S FINAL WEEKEND SATURDAY JULY 24 AT 4PM
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(Rappahannock County, VA), July 20, 2010 – Puppets have proved popular at the Castleton Festival this year with an extra performance of Manuel de Falla’s Master Pedro’s Puppet Show added to the final weekend’s schedule. The extra performance will be held on Saturday, July 24 at 4:00 p.m. in the Theatre House. Tickets are $20 and available from www.castletonfestival.org or Phone 540-937-4969.
This performance follows the premiere of this new staged production on Friday, July 23 at 7:30 p.m. A third performance will be held on Sunday, July 25 at 2:00 p.m. Both the Friday and Sunday performances are part of a double-bill that opens with a new staged production of Stravinsky’s A Soldier’s Tale and both of these performances are sold out. The Stravinsky performances will be conducted by the Castleton Festival’s Artistic Director, Lorin Maazel, and all performances of Master Pedro’s Puppet Show will be conducted by Castleton Festival Associate Conductor, Han-Na Chang. The extra performance on Saturday will include a post-performance discussion giving the audience the opportunity to meet the puppets – and the puppeteers – up close.
Master Pedro’s Puppet Show is a 30-minute one-act opera that will feature four singers and over 60 puppets created by the New York-based puppet studio, The Puppet Kitchen, and operated by six puppeteers. Master Pedro’s Puppet Show (El retablo de maese Pedro) is based on an episode in Cervantes’ novel Don Quixote. Don Quixote gets so engrossed in a puppet show he is watching that he begins to think of the puppets as real people and in a fit of heroism to save the damsel in distress, launches himself into the show, destroying all in his wake. This show-within-a-show format has provided The Puppet Kitchen and Castleton Festival Resident Director William Kerley the opportunity to create what they describe as a “loopy, slapstick, heartfelt” piece.
In addition to the Stravinsky & de Falla productions, the final weekend of the Castleton Festival held in Rappahannock County, Virginia includes performances of Puccini’s Suor Angelica and Gianni Schicchi on Thursday, July 22 at 7:30 p.m., the final full performance of Puccini’s Il Trittico on Saturday, July 24 at 7:00 p.m. and the closing concert featuring the Castleton Festival Orchestra performing Beethoven’s Symphony’s Nos. 8 & 3. The Puccini performances will be conducted by Lorin Maazel, who will also lead Beethoven’s eighth symphony on Sunday.
The Castleton Festival grew out of the Castleton Residency program for young artists run by The Châteauville Foundation, founded by Lorin Maazel and his wife Dietlinde Turban-Maazel in 1997. The Castleton Festival brings around 200 young artists including singers, conductors, instrumentalists, directors, costume designers and lighting designers to live on the property for six weeks to work with professional mentors and prepare the performances of the operas and concerts.
Tickets to all Castleton Festival events available from http://www.castletonfestival.org
or by phone 540-937-4969/1-866-974-0767.
2010 CASTLETON FESTIVAL SCHEDULE
www.castletonfestival.org
Weekend Four
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Thursday, July 22
7:30PM Suor Angelica & Gianni Scicchi by Giacomo Puccini
Venue: Festival Tent
Conductor: Lorin Maazel
Cast
Suor Angelica
Sister Angelica Rebekah Camm
Zia Principessa Maria Isabel Vera
Sister Genovieffa Hana Park
Gianni Schicchi
Gianni Schicchi Corey Crider
Lauretta Joyce El-Khoury
Rinuccio Zach Borichevsky
Zita Margaret Gawrysiak
Nella Tharanga Goonetilleke
______________________________________________________________________
Friday, July 23
7:30PM Stravinsky’s A Soldier’s Tale
Manuel de Falla’s Master Pedro’s Puppet Show
Venue: Theatre House
Conductor: Lorin Maazel
Composer: Manuel de Falla
Libretto: Manuel de Falla from Cervantes’ Don Quixote
Director: William Kerley
Choreographer: Faye Driscoll
Puppeteers: Emily DeCola, Eric Wright, Michael Schupbach, Jessica Scott, Katey Parker, Sarah Lafferty & Jonathan Levin of The Puppet Kitchen
Designer: Nicholas Vaughan
Lighting: Rie Ono
Cast
A Soldier’s Tale
The Narrator Phillip Taratula
The Soldier Sean Donovan
The Devil Mike Mikos
The Princess Toni Meleas
Master Pedro’s Puppet Show
Don Quixote Paul La Rosa
Master Pedro Tyler Nelson
The Boy Richard Pittsinger
Sancho Panza Donald Groves
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Saturday, July 24
4PM Manuel de Falla’s Master Pedro’s Puppet Show
Venue: Theatre House
Conductor: Han-Na Chang
Performance includes a post-concert discussion and “meet the puppets” session.
7PM Il Trittico by Giacomo Puccini
Venue: Festival Tent
Conductor: Lorin Maazel
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Sunday, July 25
2PM Stravinsky’s A Soldier’s Tale
Manuel de Falla’s Master Pedro’s Puppet Show
Venue: Theatre House
Conductor: Lorin Maazel / Han-Na Chang
7PM Castleton Festival Orchestra – Festival Finale
Venue: Festival Tent
Conductors: Brett Mitchell, Lorin Maazel & Han-Na Chang
Program
Beethoven Leonore Overture No. 3
Beethoven Symphony No. 8
Intermission
Beethoven Symphony No. 3, “Eroica”
FESTIVAL INFORMATION & DIRECTIONS
About Castleton Farms
Castleton Farms is located at 663 Castleton View Road, Castleton, VA 22716, about 60 miles southwest of Washington, DC (approx 80 minutes drive); approx two hours drive from Richmond and Baltimore; and approx five hours drive from New York City. Full driving directions and accommodation recommendations are available at http://www.castletonfestival.org
A Castleton Festival Shuttle will operate on the property during the festival to transport guests between the Festival Tent and carpark area to the Theatre House. Meals and refreshments will be available for purchase on the property during the festival.
Tickets to all Castleton Festival events available from http://www.castletonfestival.org
or by phone 540-937-4969/1-866-974-0767.
About The Châteauville Foundation
The Châteauville Foundation was established at Castleton Farms in 1997 by Lorin and Dietlinde Maazel. The Foundation’s mission is to nurture young artists, foster collaborative artistic enterprise and create opportunities within the community for shared cultural experience. An intimate, acoustically superb and highly versatile Theatre House on the Maazels’ 550-acre property is the focal point of the Foundation’s activities, which include a performance season of a dozen or more events, a multi-week summer festival that was inaugurated in 2009, and ongoing education and outreach activities for the community in Rappahannock County, Virginia, and beyond.
The Theatre House’s multi-purpose facilities make it ideally suited to a wide range of performances—recital and chamber music programs, jazz, world music, dance and theatre, in addition to the Residency program’s centerpiece chamber operas. The unique setting and intimacy of the space allow an unparalleled degree of communication between artists and audiences. To date, over 100 different performances have been offered at the Theatre House. The Foundation takes pride in presenting many of today’s most eminent artists (Emanuel Ax, Claire Bloom, Sir James and Lady Jeanne Galway, Itzhak Perlman, Pepe Romero, Gil Shaham, Randy Weston) alongside rewarding family programs (The Cashore Marionettes, Avner “The Eccentric” Eisenberg, Tomáš Kubínek) and new/young artists and ensembles, including the Amstel Saxophone Quartet, the Rincones Dance Company, percussionist Colin Currie, eighth blackbird, cellist Han-Na Chang, the Avalon and Attacca String Quartets, and many others. The presentations are truly international in scope from local songwriter/composer Paul Reisler to Chinese pipa virtuoso Wu Man, to Kinobe and Soul Beat Africa.
The concept of The Castleton Residency & Festival emerged from tremendous creative energies unleashed by the Foundation’s first fully-staged chamber opera production in May 2006, Benjamin Britten’s The Turn of the Screw. The Castleton Residency is now a twice annual four- to five-week program designed to connect master artists with those who will carry the performing arts forward into the next generation. It is centered on a new, fully staged chamber opera production under the artistic leadership of Maestro Lorin Maazel. Up to 200 young artists (singers, instrumentalists, conductors, designers, stage directors, coaches and stage managers) are invited to live and work together intensively in the inspiring atmosphere of Castleton Farms. The artists rehearse and perform according to the highest professional standards, while receiving practical experience/training and career guidance from mentors and visiting faculty. The Festival includes additional recitals and workshops as well as a more formal program of coaching, master classes and workshops.
For more information, please visit http://www.chateauville.org
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