Castleton Festival Awarded Grants from NEA, RAAC

May 30, 2014, Castleton, VA – The Castleton Festival, conductor Lorin Maazel’s summer residency program for young professionals and a four-week festival of music and opera based in Rappahannock County, Virginia, has been awarded two grants to support its 2014 programs.

A $30,000 grant from the NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) through the Arts Works program will support the renowned performance and young artists training opportunities of the 2014 Castleton Festival season. Art Works grants support the creation of art that meets the highest standards of excellence, public engagement with diverse and excellent art, lifelong learning in the arts, and enhancement of the livability of communities through the arts. The NEA received 1,515 eligible applications under the Art Works category, requesting more than $76 million in funding. Of those applications, 886 are recommended for grants for a total of $25.8 million.

The Castleton Festival has also been awarded a $3,000 grant from the Claudia Mitchell Fund of the Rappahannock Association for the Arts and the Community (RAAC). The grant will support the Castleton Alive arts education program for children and youth. Castleton Alive provides school-aged students with interactive experiences in the performing arts, including live opera performed at the Castleton Festival by tomorrow’s freshest and most talented stars, led by Maestro Lorin Maazel, the pre-eminent conductor of the 21st century. The program comprises both in-school workshops and half-day or full-day programs onsite at Castleton in June and July.

About the Claudia Mitchell Fund

The late Claudia Mitchell was an avid supporter of the arts, in Rappahannock. When she died, she left a bequest “to enliven and sustain the arts in Rappahannock County with the goal of enhancing the quality of our community life.” The Grant program supports emerging and established artists of all ages, arts organizations, art programs within community-based organizations, collaborative projects, and especially to programs with a community focus.

Each summer, the Festival invites more than 250 artists to Castleton where young professional singers, musicians, makeup and costumers, technicians and stagehands work on their craft alongside more experienced professionals for eight weeks of rehearsals and performances.

Castleton has been a vista-opener for over 3,000 young people through open dress rehearsals, master classes and through its C.A.T.S. (Castleton Artists Training Seminar) program for advanced vocal students which runs parallel to the four-week performance festival. Castleton is committed to engaging C.A.T.S. alumni to return in future seasons to perform leading and supporting roles.

Set in one of the most beautiful areas of Virginia, the Castleton Festival’s performances take place in two venues on the Maazels’ 600-acre Castleton Farms: the Castleton Festival Theatre is a 648 seat air-conditioned proscenium theatre that includes multi-level seating and an orchestra pit accommodating up to 90 musicians; the Theatre House is: an intimate, state-of-the-art 138 seat proscenium theatre including seating on two levels and an orchestra pit accommodating 20 musicians. The Festival is the largest non-government employer in central Virginia’s Rappahannock County.

For its sixth season in 2014 the Festival presents a new production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, along with a dramatic reading of G.B. Shaw’s Don Juan in Hell, symphonic concerts, chamber music, song recitals, and bluegrass. Repertoire from previous seasons include The Turn of the Screw, The Beggar’s Opera, Albert Herring and The Rape of Lucretia (2009); Il Trittico, A Soldier’s Tale and Master Pedro’s Puppet Show (2010); La Bohème, L’enfant et les sortilèges and Seven Deadly Sins (2011); The Barber of Seville, Carmen, and A Little Night Music (2012) and The Girl of the Golden West, Otello, and La Voix Humaine (2013).