The first ever New Ground Orchestra Festival will be held in State College this week. The festival was created to be a supportive community for professional musicians.
Beginning on Wednesday, the festival will consist of rehearsals, therapeutic exercises and community-building activities, culminating in a free, public concert in Penn State's Esber Recital Hall on Friday evening at 7:30 p.m.
During the concert, the orchestra will play three pieces, including Nancy Ives’ concerto "Immortal Beloved," a song about the women in Beethoven’s life and how they made his art possible.
Rebekah O’Brien, the founder and conductor of the New Ground Orchestra Festival, says this will be the first all-female orchestra to play the piece.
O'Brien said she got the idea for the festival last fall after she attended a showcase for female conductors in Santiago, Chile.
“The whole week was such an incredible experience of support," O'Brien said. "One of us was laughing or crying at any given moment in the sessions. And, that was a little more based in with talk sessions and rehearsals and concerts, but I still found it so enriching.”
O’Brien came back and told her colleagues about her experience in Santiago.
“Denise (Dillenbeck), who’s the concertmaster of the York Symphony, just looked at me and she said, ‘Rebekah, when are you going to create that for your colleagues? And if you do, I will be there,'" O'Brien said.
O’Brien wanted to make a space where musicians could feel supported by a community of other musicians who share their struggles.
“(I wanted) to have a space where we can share with one another the struggles of being in the performance realm for our career," O'Brien said. "(And also) the struggles that are particular to women, being mothers and performers, and other aspects of what it means to be a woman and a professional musician, and be able to have open conversations about that, to be able to support one another."
None of the festival's performers are being paid for the concert. Instead, O’Brien told each musician that if they could find a way to travel to and from State College, the festival would be free, with food and lodging provided.
Down the road, O’Brien hopes to be able to cover transportation costs, too.
“There can be a bit of extra pressure if you are playing for a paycheck," O'Brien said. "And so the sense of being able to give your gifts freely, and knowing that you’re receiving the support that you need to be able to do that ... the idea is, they get themselves here, and then the experience of the festival is a gift to them, and their performance is then a gift in return to the community.”
